What I Really Want
by The-Herbasaur
Summary: My name is Lily Evans, and I have a secret. That secret is a little crush, and no, it's not on that prat James Potter. No, no, it's much worse than that. Much worse.
1. My Secret

**A/N: So, this is my second fanfic. My other one is still in progress but almost finished. This will be my first attempt at a more light-hearted, romantic fic. Anyway, please read, and if you so wish review!**

**Oh yeah, and please check out my other fic – Behind the Veil. It's my baby, I love it. **

**What I Really Want**

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**My Secret**

**Lily's POV **

Hi, my name is Lily Evans, and I have a secret. That secret is a little crush, and _no,_ it's not on that prat James Potter. No, no, it's much worse than that. Much worse. It's Black, Sirius Black. I know, I know. It's bad. And why is that bad? Because Black will never, _ever, _like me because even if by chance he did, he would never act on it because he is Potter's best friend. Hell, we're not even on first name basis. It's an awkward situation, really, it is. I am fairly upset with myself about this; why couldn't I have picked somebody available to me to have a crush on? Ah, now, that's a good question.

As to the reason I'm bringing this up at this moment is because he is sitting right in front of me this year, our sixth, in Charms. Right now I am very aware of him sitting there. I stare at the back of his head, thinking of the front. His gorgeous face. With those stormy gray eyes. Not that the back of his head is all that bad, either. He has a head of thick, wild black hair. Suddenly my face warms. Of course Black chooses this moment to turn around in his seat and face me, a serious look on his face.

"Hey there, Evans. I know that my hair is incredibly gorgeous and everything, but it's really hard to concentrate with your eyes boring into the back of my head," he whispers, tossing his head to flick a piece of hair out of his eyes. My heart flutters and I can feel my face growing warmer, but I also think sarcastically to myself,

_Cute, why does he have to be such an arrogant prick? How very mature. Remind me again why I like this kid?_

"Git," I hiss, trying to sound like my usual confidant and fiery self, being fully aware that our conversation is being eagerly listened to by the rest of the class. Don't they have a class to be paying attention to? "If your head gets any bigger, it will crumple your neck. And for your information, I was NOT staring at your 'incredibly gorgeous hair', thank you very much."

Black flashes a cocky grin at me and I feel my heart hitch a little. Oh yes, I remember why I like him. He's just so roguishly good looking, it's not my fault, I swear. I can't help smiling back a little.

"Then you were obviously gazing at my hair and thinking of a certain other young man with the same dark hair, were you not?" He asks in a carrying whisper, waggling his eyebrows suggestively at Potter, who smiles widely back at me. Of course. Black thinks that I'm staring at him and thinking of Potter. This is just great. Did I already mention that this is an exceptionally awkward situation?

"I most certainly am NOT thinking of that stupid, ugly, idiotic, senseless, judgment-lacking, insolent, conceited, useless toe rag," I say, preferring not to foul my mouth by uttering Potter's name and avoiding looking at him as well.

"Evans, such hostility. Tut, tut. You know you like James, deep down." Now he's smirking at me. Why does he have to smirk at me like that? And if he only knew. If he only knew who I liked.

"I absolutely do not, and will not ever, like Potter, no matter how deep down you look," I say scathingly, casting Potter a particularly burning look. I'm not mad at Black, not by a long shot, at least he's talking to me, but I am quite frustrated that he's talking to me about Potter.

At this point, Professor Flitwick commands our attention at the front of the room while he does a demonstration.

"Now, watch here," he says in his squeaky little voice, balancing on top of his teetering pile of books as always. "You must first roll your wrist halfway around and then flick the end – " he moves his wand through the air as he talks, and with the last flourish, a fountain of pink hibiscus blossoms out of his wand. Flitwick lowers his wand.

"Now I want all of you to try it," he says.

I smile to myself. I already know how to do the charm, of course. Not that I'm a huge over-achiever or anything, but I read the first eleven chapters of our Charms book before summer ended and I had tried a few of the Charms on the train while on the way to Hogwarts. I move my hand in the same way as Flitwick did and out from my wand springs a chain of yellow mountain daisies.

Ellen, my best friend in the whole world, is sitting next to me and she sends me a vexed look. "How did you do that?" She hisses at me.

"It's the flick at the end," I explain. "Not too big, not too small." Ellen nods and tries again. A few blue bells spurt out of her wand. She shrugs at me.

"You'll get it," I say encouragingly. She rolls her eyes at me and mouths the words _know it all_ at me. I smirk back at her.

"I got it!" Another great friend of mine, Leona is sitting on my other side, and she happily shows Ellen and me her bouquet of beautiful blue agapanthus.

"Ooh, bully for you," Ellen says, rolling her eyes.

"You're just jealous," Leona shoots back at her.

"Jealous of a bunch of agapanthus?" Ellen asks, raising her eyebrows. "I don't think so! Now, that over there," she says, pointing with her eyes at Black. My heart flips over as my gaze follows hers to the boy. "That's something to be jealous about." I scowl slightly. I know that the majority of the female population in Hogwarts thinks Black and Potter are a pair of heartthrobs, but I do feel jealous every time I see another girl eyeing Black. I feel like I've got dibs on him, even though I know I don't.

Going back to the Charm, I wonder if I can create a different flower. I think hard, concentrating completely, and then move my wand. A bunch of orchids bloom from my wand, and I grin happily.

"Hey!" I hear Potter's unnecessarily loud voice echoing at me. He's talking so loudly so he can have the whole class's attention. Show off. "Hey, Evans!" I look at him and roll my eyes pointedly. I honestly wonder why Professor Flitwick lets him get away with this.

"What?" I demand, trying to sound as condescending as I could with that one word.

Potter beams at me. Positively beams. His nerve is unbelievable. "Look!" He cries, and flourished his wand. A flow of white lilies pours out of his wand.

"Obviously you are still laboring under the misconceptions that for one, I care that you can do the Charm, and that for two, I like lilies. It may be my name, but I much prefer daisies." I gesture at the yellow daisies on my desk and, after grinning horribly at him, I turn my head back to the front of the room…and the back of Black's head. My heart patters a bit faster. Damn, why did he have to sit there, why?

Professor Flitwick is writing something down on the blackboard, I'd probably better write it down. Frowning, I gnaw on the end of my quill, quite forgetting that feathers are not exactly my favorite thing to eat. I grimace and remove the quill from between my teeth, looking around discreetly to make sure that no one saw. No one did, so I return to my parchment and start scribbling down the notes that Flitwick is writing out for us. I am a dedicated student, I am.

Finally the end of the class is stalking nearer. I can't wait to get out of class. Not that I don't like Charms; I love Charms, I really do, but I just want to see a bit of the sun before it sets. It's fall and our daylight hours are going to be cut pretty short soon. Ellen is catching onto my irritation. She grins at me and taps her watch with her hand, rolling her eyes again. I sweat that is the only facial expression that girl has. I grin at her.

At last the long-awaited bell rings, and I immediately jump up from my seat, tossing my quill and parchment into my bag a little haphazardly, which is very unlike me, I assure you. Leona and Ellen are close behind me as I pelt out the door. Soon, but not soon enough in my opinion, we burst out of the great front doors and out onto the grounds. The sun is still in the sky and the air isn't too crisp yet. The three of us meander our way to a particularly appealing stretch of grass and sit down, dumping our bags unceremoniously on the ground.

"Ah, the last bit of sunlight," Leona sighs, leaning back on the grass with her hands behind her head as she closes her eyes to fully absorb the heat from the sun.

"Thank Merlin we caught it," Ellen adds as she leans back, propping herself up on her elbows and crossing her legs at the ankles. "I thought that Flitwick was never going to let us out of class. Theory, schmeary, I say."

"We need to know the theory for our NEWTs," I say as I sit down cross legged in the grass.

"Evens!" I would know that voice anywhere, and it is most certainly not welcome. "Hey, Evans!" I roll my eyes at Leona and Ellen, who are both giggling, and I turn around to see, yes, I guessed it, Potter.

"I have a theory, Evans," Potter says as he walks over to us with Black, Lupin, and Pettigrew in tow. Black grins at me, tossing his head and making his beautiful hair ruffle. He really finds Potter's infatuation with me quite amusing. It's sickening, really. I can't grin back at him because I know what is coming.

"And why would I bloody care that you have a theory?" I ask, more than a little hostilely.

Potter grins all over his stupid, ugly face. "Because it's about you," he says as he sits down next to me and wraps his arm around my shoulders. Black, Lupin, and Pettigrew stand around us, Lupin looking a little awkward as he smiles hesitantly at Leona, who blushes faintly when she makes eye contact with him and looks away hastily.

"That makes me want to hear it even less," I say, ducking out from under Potter's arm and scooting away.

"Evans, that hurts," Potter says, clutching at his heart.

"And you think I care…why?" I ask, glowering at him.

"Because my theory is that if I ask you enough times, you will eventually fall victim to my charm and wit!" Potter grins.

"I will never fall for you so-called charm and wit," I scowl at him. "As you don't have any." I stand up angrily.

"Come on girls, let's go somewhere where there isn't scum lying around," I say, standing up quickly and brushing off my robes. Leona and Ellen get to their feet, but much more slowly and looking more than a little upset that we were leaving the grass.

"Leaving already, Evans?" Potter asks, looking surprised and getting to his feet hastily too. Why is he surprised? How many times have I told him that he's a moron? Apparently it still hasn't gotten through his thick skull. He must be more stupid than I thought. Only I know he's not stupid. They all get relatively good marks, the Marauders.

"Yes, and if you try and follow me, I'll hex you," I say, drawing my wand and throwing a horrible look in his direction before grabbing Ellen's and Leona's hands and flouncing off across the lawn towards the lake with the two girls in tow behind me. I look over my shoulder and see Black patting Potter's shoulder, while Lupin was looking at him with a I-told-you-so look on his face, and Pettigrew stood there still looking slightly awkward. At that moment, Black looked up and our eyes locked. Instantly I felt a little lighter and my stomach flipped over. I shot a small smile at him and then turned my head back to face in front of me, still holding Leona's and Ellen's hands.

"Lily, when are you going to realize that Potter is the one for you?" Ellen asks as we continue to walk away. I huff loudly.

"Never, because he's not," I say. "Can you honestly see me with him?"

"Yes," Leona mutters, but under her breath so that (she thinks) I don't hear. I don't know what is wrong with them, but they are both convinced that Potter and I are made for each other. Little do they know that I harbor a secret liking for another dark haired, handsome boy.

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**A/N: So, what do you think? Please review! Please? You know you want to. :D **

**And don't forget to check out my other fic if you so wish!**


	2. She's Got A Little Crush

**A/N: It's the first of the month, and I wanted to start off right away with a new chapter! Thanks go out to those who read my first chapter, and who are continuing to read this. And welcome to all you who are new readers. So, without further ado, read on! **

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**She'**s **Got A Little Crush**

**Lily's POV**

The three of us are sitting in the Gryffindor Common Room, trying to finish our homework. Or rather, _I _am trying to finish my homework. Ellen and Leona are both totally engrossed in the antics of the boys in the Common Room. Namely the Marauders. Currently Black and Potter are juggling pumpkin pasties and tossing them to each other and back again. I have to admit that, though I would never say it, I am rather impressed with their skills. I've watched Muggle street performers juggling flaming torches, and I have to say that Black and Potter are about as good as any I've seen. But be that as it may, it is Sunday evening and I really do need to finish my essay for Ancient Runes, and how am I supposed to do that when the entire Common Room is shouting and clapping? I will have to exercise my Prefect authority.

I throw down my quill and stand up. As I walk over to Black and Potter, I fix a frown on my face, but even so I feel my heart skip a little when I stand next to Black. I reach out my hand and knock the pumpkin pasty away so that it flies across the room and hits poor Frank Longbottom on the head. Black looks over at me, a shocked and hurt expression playing on his face; I can tell he's trying hard not to smile, but not quite managing it. I try very hard not to swoon.

"Evans!" He exclaims, drawing the whole attention of everyone in the Common Room, including those who had not been paying attention to the juggling act. "You just ruined my fun." He plants his hands on his hips, protrudes his bottom lip and makes big puppy eyes at me. My heart flips over. Standing this close to him makes my head go fuzzy and I feel like I'm floating. How can I refuse him?

Damn, I have to. I can't let him win this.

"Why are you always such a stuck in the muck?" Black demands. Now, that's not fair. I am not a suck in the muck! But perhaps now is not the time to argue this.

"Because, Black, unlike some other particular people, I am determined to pass my NEWTs with good grades and therefore would like to study." I say. I'm standing too close to him, I can't think straight when I'm this near him. I take a step back, but still look firmly at him.

"Evans," Potter says. "We're not taking NEWTs until next year!"

"Potter, you shut up!" I say.

"You don't tell Sirius to shut up," Potter says, looking hurt. I don't even spare him a look. He's not worth burning my eyes over.

"That's because he's not a complete insufferable idiot." I shoot right back at him.

"Evans, that's not playing nicely," Black says. "James gets good marks – just as good as you, if I'm not much mistaken. And in all fairness I'm probably the bigger idiot of the two of us!" He grins around the room to many chuckles from our fellow Gryffindors. I throw my hands up in the air.

"You two are just impossible!" I cry. Then I round on Lupin. "Lupin, why don't you exercise some _control _over these two?" I demand, walking over to him and getting up in his face. "You're a Prefect, for Merlin's sake. You're _supposed _to make sure that everybody follows the rules. And that 'everybody' includes your stupid little friends over there." Of course there is nothing particularly stupid or little about Potter or Black, but all the same…

Lupin just simply shrugs his shoulders and looks slightly bored. Bored? Merlin grant me patience. "You seem to have it all under control," he says, but he has the sense to look at me apologetically.

"Well, I want _you _to try and keep them under control," I say, before whirling around and stamping back to the corner where Leona and Ellen are sitting. Neither of them look at me when I sit down, but they both seem to be smirking.

"What?" I demand.

"Oh, nothing," Leona says, still smirking slightly. I frown at them.

"Are you saying that I should have let them carry on like that?" I inquire.

"We weren't saying anything, Lily," Ellen replies. Right. They weren't. Ellen makes me so mad sometimes. I content myself with making a sarcastic face at her before returning to my essay. Damn, I left off in the middle of a sentence, and I don't remember what I was writing.

"Oh, come on Lily," Leona says, leaning over and twitching my parchment away from me. "Let's just hang out."

"But – I can't – my essay – " I splutter, trying snatch back my essay, but Leona holds it out of reach.

"It's not due until Wednesday," she says.

"I – how do you know?" I falter. Leona's not in Ancient Runes. Leona smirks at me.

"I'm just brilliant like that," she says.

"Come on," Ellen adds. "Let's go get a Butterbeer in the Kitchens."

I stare at her. "_Ellen, _I'm a _Prefect_!" I hiss.

"So break the rules every now and again. Up you get, you're coming with us," Leona grabs under my arms and hoists me from my seat and, firmly gripping me by the elbow, leads me from the Common Room with me protesting the whole way.

Ten minutes later and we are entering the Kitchens.

"How do you know where the Kitchens are?" I ask Ellen.

"Being a flit has its advantages," Ellen replies, grinning saucily. Ellen can get any guy she wants, whenever she wants. "Boys always want to go to the Kitchens."

"Hello, misses," a house elf says, bowing low to the three of us. "What can we do for you?"

"We'd like three Butterbeers," Leona answers. Almost instantly it seems, I see a tray with three Butterbeers balanced on it come flying across the Kitchens, a tiny house elf supporting it over her head.

"Here is your drinks, miss," the elf says to Leona. We each grab a bottle and sit down on the bar stools around the counter, popping open our Butterbeers witch hiss satisfactorily.

After taking a sip, Leona smiles and says, "On to the gossip! We haven't had a good gossip session in a while!" I fight to keep from rolling my eyes. Honestly, I'm not into the whole gossip session thing.

"Ooh, me first!" Ellen says after taking a swig.

"Let me guess…a new guy?" I say, rolling my eyes at Leona, who grins back at me.

"Not fair! He's really nice," Ellen says, sipping primly on her Butterbeer. "Carl Davis, do you know him? He's in Ravenclaw."

"Ooh, the handsome one!" Leona exclaims.

"Of course he's handsome," I say, "Since when does Ellen go for anything else?" I hadn't meant to be so mean; it just kind of slipped out. I took a sip of my Butterbeer.

"Lily, be nice!" Ellen says to me, poking my shoulder. "And what about you? Have you recognized that you are actually, really-truly star-struck by Potter? Or have you not come to that realization yet?"

"I most certainly do not like Potter!" I say defiantly, but I can't help a faint blush from creeping up my neck and face as I think of another boy with wild black hair. I take another sip of Butterbeer to hide my embarrassment.

"Ha!" Leona says. "But you're blushing now! You do like him, I knew you did!"

"No, I do not," I say. "I really don't."

"So why do you never express any interest in any other guys?" Ellen asks, folding her arms and pretending to look imperious.

"I – because – well – " I stutter. How can I tell them that I like someone else? Someone so close to Potter?

"You like Potter," Leona says simply.

"No, I don't," I say in a quiet voice. All three of us have forgotten about our Butterbeers and they sit ignored on the counter. "I like someone else," I say so quietly that they might not have heard. But of course Ellen did.

"You like _someone else_?" She practically shrieks.

"Hey!" I say, looking around the room. All the house elves had stopped cooking when Ellen had shrieked and are looking over in our direction quizzically.

"What?" Ellen says. "You think the house elves are going to go telling the students?"

"Tell us who it is!" Leona says, bouncing up and down ion her seat. She is so excitable.

I shake my head no. Ellen grabs my hand and shakes it up and down.

"Pretty pretty please?" She begs. "Pretty please tell us?" I shake my head again.

"You have to!" Leona says. "You can't just tell us that you like someone else besides Potter and then sit there and not tell us who it is."

"Well, I think I just have," I say.

"You _can't_!" Leona whines.

"Yes, I can," I say positively. I can't let themknow. I can't let them know how my pitter patters when I'm near him, how I feel lightheaded and faint, how sometimes my breath catches in my throat when I talk to him, how my stomach flips over, how I just melt when I see him smile at me. I can't let them know any of that. They would tease me till the end of the Earth. Not to mention that they would probably be very disappointed in me. The whole school expects that I really love Potter deep down and just don't know it. The only problem is that I don't love him. There's somebody else. But I can't help who I fall for! I mean to say…

I can feel myself blushing just thinking about Black. Leona whistles.

"You really like whoever this lucky man is, don't you?" She teases. "You're blushing and you haven't even told us who it is!" I blush even deeper. Damn. Why do I always have to blush?

I pick my Butterbeer up off the counter and take a dignified sip. "It's really no big deal," I say. "And what about you, Leona?" I ask, changing the direction of the conversation on purpose. Ellen immediately catches on.

"Yes, who do you like, Leona?" She asks, drinking deeply from her bottle. It's Leona's turn to blush.

"Oh, I don't know," she giggles.

"Yes you do, yes you do!" Ellen says, poking Leona in the stomach.

"Come on, Leona, tell us!" I say. I don't mind discussing other people's crushes. But I mind discussing mine on Black. I mind a lot.

"You didn't tell us who you like, so why would I tell you who I like?" Leona asks. Why is she so smart?

"Yes, but it's not interesting who I like," I say, grinning. "Now, Leona, the pretty girl who never dates, now that's interesting who she likes!"

"But you never date either!" Leona says.

"That's only because all the boys consider me off limits because Potter thinks I'm his," I say a little crossly, thinking of how Black would never betray Potter like that.

"Just tell us," Ellen whines at Leona.

"Oh, alright then." Leona says, giving in. "I like that Lupin bloke, Remus Lupin." She's blushing quite deeply.

Ellen looks at her appraisingly. "He's alright." She says finally, nodding her head a bit. "I think you two could be good together."

"Well, I'm so glad I have your approval," Leona drawls sarcastically.

"No, no, this is good," I say. If Leona dates Remus, I will have an excuse to hang out with Black. Of course I would have to put up with Potter, too…

"How is this good?" Leona questions.

"Oh, I don't know," I say. "Maybe if Lupin hangs out with us, he might be more compelled to control Black and Potter more."

"Oh, Lily," Ellen jokes, slapping my arm. "Always concerned about the rules. You know there's more to life than just the chains that Hogwarts teachers put on us."

"They're not chains! They're for the good of everybody," I say defensively.

"Anyway," Ellen continues, rolling her eyes at me and turning back to Leona. "So, when and how are you planning to get Lupin?"

"What makes you think I want to 'get him'?" Leona asks.

"Oh come on, Lea," Ellen says, holding Leona's hand. "You're so pretty, but you never give any guys a chance. There are definitely guys who would love to go out with you."

"So it's all about how I look now?" Leona asks defensively.

"No, no, that wasn't what I was saying," Ellen says hastily. "I was just saying that you never wear makeup or nice clothes – "

"I don't want a guy to like me because I look hot," Leona says.

"Alright, alright, you two," I say hastily.

"So, how are we going to go about getting Lupin for you?" Ellen asks.

"Like I was saying before, what makes you think I want to get him?" Leona says testily.

"So you just want to like him and have nothing come of it?" I ask.

"Well…"

"Oooh, let's do this!" Ellen says, clapping her hands.

"Do what?" I ask suspiciously.

"Get Lupin for Leona!"

"I don't want – " Leona began, but Ellen cut her off.

"Lil, can you put up with Potter and _please _don't yell at him?"

"Why?" I demand.

"Because we're going to be spending a lot more time around them!" Ellen explains. "It's going to be so cute! Leona and Lupin, Leona and Lupin, Leona and Lupin!" She chants happily.

Leona and I both groan; but inwardly, I'm thinking, _I get to get closer to Black!_

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**A/N: Did you like it? I know there wasn't much Sirius in this chapter, but there will be in future chapters, of course. So, please review, I would love it so very much if you did!**

**Also, be sure and check out my other story, it's getting very close to being finished!**


	3. Something Unexpected

**A/N: No reviews for my last chapter. Oh well. Here's my next chappie. **

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**Something Unexpected**

**Sirius's POV**

I can't lie and say I wasn't surprised when Lily, Ellen, and their friend, I think her name hassomething to do with a lion, came over to us in the Common Room and sat down on the couch right across from us. James is looking like Christmas has come early and that he got extra presents. He immediately ruffles his hair, looking at the girls (well, Lilyto be specific). I have to admit, James has a point about Lily. Not that I would ever do anything about it, but I'm just saying. Whatever, I don't even know what I'm talking about anymore. Remus is looking awkward and a little nervous; I don't blame him, he probably thinks Lily is going to start telling him off again. Peter? Well, he's just looking shell-shocked at the fact that there are _girls _sitting this close to him. As for me, well, I'm not really fussed either way, although this does mean that now I will have to put up with James's rants about how 'Lily came over and sat by him all on her own accord!' Hey, she sat near me too, for that matter.

"Hello, boys," Ellen says, crossing her legs as she sat on the couch. "What's up with you all tonight?"

Lily looks like it's taking all of her self control to not start yelling at James. I wonder what they're doing over here anyway. It's not like our groups hang out together regularly.

"Just chilling and thinking of new ways to cause mayhem," I drawl, propping my feet up on the coffee table in between our couches. Lily opens her mouth, probably to remind us of school rules, but then she looks quickly at Ellen and the Lion Girl and closes it hurriedly. This really must be important if Lily is going to refrain from trying to put us in line.

"So what brings you ladies over here?" I ask, mildly interested. About as interested as I get in anything that doesn't involve pulling pranks with my best mates.

Ellen smiles brightly. A lot of the boys – most of the boys, really – think that Ellen is all that. I won't lie; she is a cute bird, but just not quite what I like, not much smarts with that one. Lily on the other hand is pretty _and_ brilliant. But it's not like I think of her like that.

"I just thought that we should get to know each other better." She says lightly.

"And why would you want to get to know us better?" I ask suspiciously. James had better snap out of it, I don't want to be the only one carrying on this conversation. And why isn't Lily saying anything? I suppose that it's taking all of her concentration to keep from railing on James. I glance at him, but he still needs to put his eyes back in. I elbow him. Hard.

"Ouch!" He exclaims. "Padfoot, what was that for?" He demands.

"Just getting your attention," I say, shrugging my shoulders. "So," I ask, turning my attention back to the girls, "why would you want to get to know us better?"

I definitely notice the girls exchanging significant looks. Merlin. Girls and their 'looks'. They can communicate an entire book's worth of information just by looking at each other. And unfortunately for us blokes, they expect us to be able to do the same. Damn girls.

Maybe Lily is finally falling for our James. My stomach feels funny as I think that. I suppose it's because I'm so used to their bickering that I'd miss it. I wouldn't miss a Lily and James argument for anything. They definitely keep me amused. I have to admit, I've made James go talk to her several times when I was bored. Hey, don't blame me, it's great entertainment!

Anyway, when are they ever going to answer my bloody question? I raise my eyebrows at them, hoping to get them to hurry up.

"Well, you know," Ellen says hurriedly. Why is she the one giving all the answers? Usually Lily is so outspoken that you can't get her to shut up. I notice that she's watching me closely. I smile at her, and she smiles vaguely back. Maybe she's a little out of it.

"You're our fellow Gryffindors, so we should get to know you," Ellen continues. I'd forgotten she was talking.

"Right," I say sarcastically. If that is true, I'll eat James's socks. And James's socks are disgusting. "What do you really want?" I ask. Surely there is some obscure reason that they're doing this. Lily would never willingly come within a ten foot radius of James unless there was a very good reason to.

"Sirius, would you stop trying to drive away anybody who tries to talk to us?" Remus says. Oh, right. I forgot. He's got a thing for Lion Girl. You know, I should probably find out what her names really is. Ah, well, I don't think it really matters. As if he's got a chance with her.

"Oh, alright. For you, mate," I say, leaning back into the cushions and making myself comfortable. There is a bit of an awkward silence as we all sit there, nobody knowing what exactly to say.

"Well, as entirely captivating as this is…" I say, stretching and yawning. "I think I'm off to bed if this is as exciting as this is going to get." I'm about to get up when I see Remus shoot me a pleading look.

"On the other hand," I say lightly, "how 'bout a game of chess, Lily?" She's the only one I even remotely know out of these girls, even though that's only because she's been the object of James's affection for about a year or so now. She looks at me and smiles brilliantly. I can't help but smile back. What? Her smile is catching!

"Sure," Lily says quickly, "let me go get my pieces." She stands up to head up to her Dormitory.

"Same," I say, meandering up the stairs to my own.

I flip open the lid of my trunk and rummage through it for a bit before pulling out my chess set. It's made of ebony and ivory. All down to my family's fortune. It does look nice, I suppose. But I'd rather distance myself from everything related to them, really I would. Them and their pureblood shit.

When I come back down, they had rearranged themselves. Lily is sitting across from my spot with Ellen on her right side. James is sitting on Ellen's other side and on my side of the couch Remus is sitting with Lion Girl and Peter. I wonder how Remus got her to sit there. Probably his charm. Oh, right, what charm? I don't mean to be that way, but really, Remus hasn't got much of a way with the ladies.

I don't say anything about the switch of seats, but sit down and dump out my chess set. Lily's eyes widen.

"That's a really nice set," she says, picking up an ivory Rook.

"It was my uncle's," I say lightly. "Do you want black or white?"

"Um, black," came her reply.

I raise an eyebrow at her. "You don't want to go first?" I ask.

"Going first isn't necessarily an advantage," she responds, picking up her black King and setting him down in his spot.

"Good point," I agree with her as I too begin to set up my pieces. I told you this girl is smart.

Pretty soon I find myself engaged in a much more interesting and difficult game than I had anticipated that I was getting myself into. I'm not a master at chess, but I am fairly decent, I can beat James, anyway. Remus, now, that's another story; but he's a chess wiz. Lily however, is just as much a challenge as Remus is, if not more so. I wouldn't have guessed that she had it in her. I'm not saying I thought she was stupid, I already said I think she's brilliant, it's just she's a book-smart kind of girl and playing chess doesn't involve book smarts.

Damn, I wasn't paying attention and she just captured my Knight! I watch as her Castle drags my Knight off the board. I really need to pay more attention to the game.

"You talked to Snivilus lately?" I ask. Lily stiffens and looks at me shocked. They are all looking at me shocked. Hell, I'm shocked. I don't know what made me say that. I swear, sometimes I say the stupidest things.

"No," Lily says, purposefully avoiding everybody's eyes and staring at the chess board. "I haven't talked to him since…since…" Her voice trails off.

"Since the end of fifth year when he called you…" Ellen supplies but she trails off too.

"A mudblood," I say bluntly.

"Yeah," Lily whispers. Shit. Now I feel bad.

"Er…" I'm not the best one when it comes to situations like this. I don't know what to say. With the guys I just laugh and they get what I'm talking about, or at least let it slide, but I don't know how to communicate with girls unless it's blatant flirting.

"It's OK," Lily says, but I can tell that it's not. I guess, after all, he had been her friend.

"Black, that was way out of line," Ellen frowns at me.

"Padfoot, you prat!" James exclaims. Good, I was beginning to think he would never defend his girl. His girl. Since when is she his girl? "Don't talk to Evans about that."

"Really, Sirius, you know better than that," Remus says sternly, looking at me with a hard look in his eye.

"Jeeze!" I say overdramatically and throwing my hands theatrically up in the air. "Don't everybody jump on me at once!"

"It's OK," Lily says again. "Let's just drop it, alright?" She looks at me and the next thing I know she has a smirk lighting up her face.

"What, Evans?" I ask, completely bewildered.

Her hand lifts her Bishop up into the air and moves it across the board. "Check, mate," she says calmly. I look down at the board. She's right. I lost.

"Oh. Um, good game, Evans," I say, trying not to sound too particularly upset about losing. I really am a sore loser, but I hate to admit that. I retake my position of leaning back in the couch and feet propped up on the table.

Remus takes the lead in the conversation. That is rare, let me tell you. Maybe he's trying to get Lion Girl's attention.

"So, are you girls looking forward to the next Hogsmead trip?" He asks all of them, but he's looking at Lion Girl. I notice that a faint blush is creeping up her cheeks. Hey, maybe Moony has a chance after all.

"Yeah," Ellen says. She looks at the other girls and then asks, "Do you boys have any plans for that weekend?"

"Yeah, actually," I say sarcastically, "our plans are to go to Hogsmead." I know what she was really asking, but it's fun to play the dumb idiot and watch it frustrate people. And I'm not disappointed – Ellen frowns slightly and rolls her eyes at me before turning away and looking at James, who is sitting next to her.

"So _do_ you have anything planned?" She asks.

"Well," James grins cheekily. He gets up and sits on the coffee table right in front of Lily, almost blocking her from my view. "Evans," he begins, "how about it? You and me – together at Hogsmead?" For some reason Lily glances at me before rounding her whole attention on James. Poor guy.

"Well, Potter, haven't you listened to a word I've ever said? If you think we'll be going _together_, you've got another thing coming for you," she says scathingly.

James reaches out and takes her hand and kisses it. I feel like telling James to drop it, but I don't say it. Lily rips her hand back from his grip. "But Evans, how can you refuse me?" He asks with the great puppy eyes. He shouldn't have done that. He's not as good at the innocent puppy eyes as I am.

"Looks like she just did, mate," I say, patting him on the shoulder.

"Evans, Evans, Evans." James says, shaking his head. "When are you going to realize that you're head over heels in love with me? You can't keep fighting it, love." He winks at her. Lily stands up, knocking the chess board flying.

"Potter, Potter, Potter," she sneers. "When are you going to realize that you really need to shrink your overly large head and _grow up_?" She demands, and then turns on her heel and storms towards the staircase that leads up to the girls' dormitories. When she reaches the first step, she turns around and says,

"Black, if you ever fancy another chess game, you know where to find me. _Without _Potter," she stresses, and then flurries up the stairs. Ellen and Lion Girl get up rather reluctantly and follow her.

"Smooth one, Prongs," I say grinning. "Real smooth. That went over very well, I think."

"Oh, shut your face, Padfoot," he says. "What exactly is it about me that makes her so mad?"

"Well, reading in between the lines, mate, I'd say she thinks you're a tad big headed and immature," I say, and I can't help from grinning.

"I said, shut your face, Padfoot."

"Yes, but then you asked a question. Did you want me to ignore your question?" I ask. I really know how to get on people's nerves.

James shoves me. "Shut your face," he repeats and moves from the coffee table back to the couch, sitting in what had been Lily's place. "I don't have a chance with her, do I?" He says dejectedly. I yawn pointedly and tune out. I'm seriously quite bored with this "why doesn't Lily like me" conversation.

" – you can if you want to," I hear James says and I see him looking at me.

"Can if I want to what?" I ask, still bored, so bored in fact, I almost didn't notice Remus's amazed look on his face. Almost. So James had finally said something brilliant!

James looks extremely put out. "Do I really have to repeat myself?" He asks weakly.

"Well, you do if you ever want me to know what you said," I say, giving him a look that says "stupid idiot".

James looks like he can't repeat what he said. He opens his mouth a couple times but no noise comes out. Finally he sighs. "I can't say it again. Remus, you tell him."

Remus looks nervously at James and I really begin to gain curiosity to find out whatever it was that James said that is so important.

"James, um. James said that – youcouhafagowiLily," he says very quickly. I raise a quizzical eyebrow.

"Sorry, Remus," I say, "I don't speak babble."

Remus avoids James's eyes. "He said you could have a go with Lily, if you want." He says very quietly. Almost so quietly I don't hear him. But I do. And I can't believe what I heard. Why does my stomach feel light all of a sudden?

"James, you fool," I say, completely dumb struck. "You've had your eyes on her for more than a year now."

James looks at his knees rather than me. "Yeah, well, she obviously can't stand me, but she said she'd like to spend more time with you."

"She never said that," I say quickly.

"She as good as did," James insists. "She said 'if you fancy another chess game, you know where to find me'. She obviously can stand you."

I let out a bark of a laugh. "Would I seriously do that to you, Prongs?" I ask, still laughing. I realize I sound a bit manic and stop.

To my surprise, James doesn't reply to me, he doesn't even laugh. He simply stands up, mumbles something about going to bed and climbs the stairs to the boys' dormitories in a very crestfallen manner. I stare after him.

"He wasn't serious, was he?" I ask Remus incredulously.

Remus just shrugs at me. "Beats me, mate. But he did look a little serious, yeah."

I'm still staring after James.

"You're not thinking about it, are you?" Remus asks me softly.

I let out another bark of laughter. "Na, of course not," I say. Once again I realize I sound manic laughing like this and I wonder since when do I have a manic laugh. I'm still staring after James. Whatever it was that I thought he had said, it certainly wasn't that.

"I don't get it," says Peter. "What are you guys talking about?" I look at him and shake my head.

"Things way above your comprehension level," I sigh.

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**A/N: There ya go! You know what to do…click that little review button!**


	4. Lea, Lil, and Elle

**A/N: Thanks go out to those who read, and special thanks go out to those who reviewed! One of the reviewers mentioned that they thought changing between Lily's and Sirius's POV's made the story stronger. What do the rest of you think? I like it because I get to write from both the perspectives. **

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**Lily's POV**

"Liiiiiiilyyyyyy!" Ellen moans, grabbing hold of my elbow as we walk down to breakfast. "Tell me who you like!"

"I told you I can't!" I say, but I grin and loop my arm through hers and my other one through Leona's.

"Yes, but why can't you?" Ellen asks.

"Did you make some sort of pact that you can't tell anyone?" Leona jokes.

"No, but – "

"But nothing, Lil!" Ellen says, giggling. "Lea told us who she likes! Friends tell!"

I can feel myself giving in. These girls will never stop until I tell them anyway, I may as well tell them now.

"OK," I say, avoiding their eyes. "But you have to swear not to tell anyone else."

"Cross my heart and hope to die!" Ellen says eagerly.

"Alright." I pause, take a deep breath, grimace, and whisper, "It's Black."

"WHAT?" Both Leona's and Ellen's voices explode throughout the hallway. I glance quickly around to make sure that nobody's paying us any attention.

"Oh, Merlin," Ellen gasps, holding a hand over her mouth; always the dramatic one, she is. "You are in trouble, aren't you?"

"Great," Leona says bitterly. "My best friend is a just another girl who's crazy about Black. I thought you were above that, Lily!" I frown at her. I take offence to that.

I take my arm from around my friends' arms and hide my face in my hands. "I don't know what to do!" I cry, my voice muffled through my hands.

"Potter's going to be heartbroken," Leona says.

"Well, this was…" Ellen fades off.

"Unexpected?" Leona supplies sourly.

"Yes," Ellen agrees. "Very unexpected." I look up from my hands to see the both of them are looking at me as though I just ruined their favorite dream.

"It's not my fault!" I exclaim. "It's not like I asked this to happen! Why are you looking at me like that?"

"Well, what good is going to come of this, Lily?" Leona asks seriously. Trust her to come up with the most difficult question there was for this situation.

"What good is going to come of what?" I hear a voice I recognize very well coming from behind me, a voice that makes me weak at the knees. I turn around and see – yes, I guessed it – Black.

"Um, I, er," I stutter.

Leona saves my skin. "What good is going to come of all this useless homework that Professor Slughorn assigned us," she quickly says. Maybe she disapproves of Black, but she's still my friend, thank Merlin.

"Ah, good one, Lion Girl," Black says. I stare at him.

"_Lion Girl_?" I ask. I'm so shocked my body forgets to be queasy around him. "You don't even know her name?"

"Of course I know her name!" Black says defensively.

"Right," Leona says, hands on her hips. "What is it then?"

"Ah, you see, that is, I, um. Alright, you got me. I don't know your name," Black says. He looks completely unabashed. I roll my eyes.

"For your _information,_" Leona says in an aggravated voice, "it's Leona."

Black snaps his fingers and smiles brightly. Woops, there goes my heart again. I almost find myself giggling. Giggling? Merlin, I have _got_ to get control of myself.

"Of course it is!" Black says, still grinning. He wraps one of his arms around Leona's shoulders and the other around mine (I know my face is brilliantly red…I swear I'm going to faint…I can't take him being this close to me) and continues walking down the hall.

"Yours' is Lea, this is Lil, and that's Elle," he says, gesturing to Ellen, but I can tell he's joking now. And how did he know all of our nicknames? Besides, I can't possibly be angry with him when he's got his arm around me.

"Black, just because you can charm every other girl in the school, doesn't mean you can charm me," Leona says, ducking out from under her arm. Black simply smiles at her, removes his arm from around my shoulders and replaces it around my waist and hugs me tight to his side.

"I don't have to worry about you, Lea, I've got Lil here, that's all I need," he jokes, but I know my face is the color of coral. I glance at the expression on Leona's face, which makes her look like she's about to Avada someone (probably me or Black), and quickly extricate myself from Black's arm. I straighten my robes and will my face back to its pale color. It doesn't work, but I still try to look as dignified as possible.

"Seriously, Black?" I say. "What do you think you're playing at?" I don't know what I'm saying and I don't know why I'm saying it. Merlin, I'm probably ruining all my chances. I don't want to look at him, but I do. I chance a look at his face, and I must be imagining it, but I think I see a touch of annoyance. I must be kidding myself.

I look primly away from Black, and re-loop my arms through Leona's and Ellen's and start back off down the corridor.

As soon as we are out of sight, Ellen breaks out laughing.

"Oh, Lily, dear, you have got it bad. Your face was so red you could have been the setting sun," she giggled.

"Honestly, Lily," Leona said huffily. "You don't really like him, do you? This is just some silly crush, right? Because the only thing Black has going for him is his looks."

"But he is so roguishly good looking!" I smile despite myself.

"So this is all it is, isn't it? You just like him because he's good looking." Leona is looking like she is going to Avada somebody again. And I do not want to be the victim.

"Look, Leona, I don't know what it is. I hardly know him, but I do know how he can make me feel. Just a smile from him can send my heart soaring." I say, perfectly honestly.

"You and the rest of the female population of Hogwarts," Leona mutters.

"Oh, Lea, don't be such a spoil sport," Ellen says. "Now we have double the excuse to hang out with the Marauders. Not that I approve of your liking Black at all, Lily," she adds hastily. "Actually, on second thought, maybe we should avoid the Marauders…" she trails off as she looks at me. I sigh and kind of collapse into myself.

"Look, I know nothing will ever come of this, so why don't we just ignore it and focus on Leona and Lupin?" I say, trying to make peace within our group.

"We are _not _bringing this up again!" Leona says vehemently.

"Come on, Leona, it could be fun," Ellen tries to persuade the girl. I don't think she's going to get very far.

"Well," Leona pauses. "Alright, but only for a while, just to test the waters, right?" OK. I was mistaken. Since when does Leona give in like that?

Ellen looks like Christmas has come early. "You two will be sooo cute together!" She smiles.

"Will be?" Leona says. "Who says we're even getting together in the first place?"

"Oh, but you will," Ellen says. Leona huffs.

"I still can't believe that you think you like Black," she says testily. I can't believe she's bringing this up again. This is the very reason that I was not going to tell them in the first place. I know that they will never, ever, let this rest, now that they know. Merlin.

"Can we just forget everything about that?" I ask, almost pleadingly. I really don't want to be hammered with Black-insults all the time and the two of them "trying to make me see sense" about him. I don't know. I seriously don't know what this is. All I know is that he makes me supremely nervous and that my heart pitter patters every time he's near me.

**Sirius's POV**

I honestly don't know what made me do it, but when I pulled Lily close to me and said that she was all I need, I kind of felt like I was being honest. And I'm not very honest when it comes to girls. Don't get me wrong, I've just never been all that fascinated by one. So why Lily?

I guess I have to thank Merlin that James wasn't around though. He probably would have murdered me on the spot. Or hexed me into an oblivion. One of the two.

I must be going insane. Maybe I should try and sleep more and do less prowling of the corridors at night. I can't feel like that about Lily, she's James's, everybody knows that. He's my best mate, and I don't mess around with that. However, James's words come sneaking into my brain, unwilled. Well, I didn't hear James say them, but Remus says he did. _You can have a go with Lily if you want. _I shake my head. He didn't mean it, he was just feeling down. I mean, of course he's down – how many times can a guy get rejected by the same girl? I can't do that to my best mate. And since when do I like Lily? Wait, did I just say I like her? There is definitely something wrong with my brain right now. Maybe somebody hexed me.

I watch Lily disappearing with her two friends. Man, Lion Girl looks right pissed. But I've always known she doesn't think much of me. Oh well, I can't please 'em all!

Damn, I just spent so much time worrying about Lily, I'm going to be late for Charms!

I dash into the classroom, skidding into my seat just as the bell rings. I raise my arms triumphantly in the air as though celebrating the winning of the Quidditch World Cup. Everyone in the room laughs, but the laugh that stands out most is Lily's quiet giggle behind me. I can't help myself; I turn around to look at her. Her bright emerald green eyes captivate me and I'm momentarily speechless and I catch myself falling into them. Cliché, I know. I shake my head a little experimentally to shake off the feeling and smile dazzlingly at her. She blushes and looks down at her parchment.

"Now, Black, if you would kindly turn around, I can begin this lesson," I hear tiny little Professor Flitwick squeak at me. I tear my eyes away from the top of Lily's red head and turn around in my seat. I catch James's eye and wink. I don't know why, but hey, I can do whatever the hell I want.

I try to listen to Professor Flitwick, I really do. But honestly, I don't really need to pay attention in class. Just a quick look through the book and I've got it. I think Muggles call it a photographic memory. I don't give a damn what it's called, but it makes school pretty effing easy.

Instead of paying attention, my mind wanders, but pretty soon, I get that feeling that someone is staring at me. And I know it is Lily Evans. She is staring at me again. I assure you, this is rather odd, as she is very much the one who always pays rapt attention in class. I try to turn discretely in my seat to face her.

"Like I told you the other day, Evans," I say in an undertone, "it's pretty darn difficult to concentrate when you're eyeing my delicious hair." We lock eyes and I can't help noticing how very nice her eyes are.

"Black, please turn around now!" Flitwick's voice breaks through our gaze. I smirk at her before standing up, and holding my arms up like a ballerina, spin around on the spot amid gales of laughter from my fellow students. I primly smile around at all of them and curtsy in several different directions. Everybody laughs; I can even see that Flitwick is trying not to smile too broadly.

"Thank you for your exhibition," he says, trying to sound stern and quite failing. "Now, will you please behave?" I tilt my head to one side, shrug, and sit back down. It looks like Flitwick is trying very hard to not roll his eyes. I can't help but grin at him, and rather reluctantly he smiles, too. I love making people smile. I know, I know, that's a very sentimental statement coming from yours truly, but I do. The world could do with some more smiles. Maybe if my family smiled more I'd like them better. No, probably not, because they would still have all their stupid pureblood ideals.

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**A/N: I'm sorry that took me so long to update. I had the chapter written up for a while, but I just now got around to posting it.**

**As always, please review!**


	5. She's Mine

**A/N: Here's my next chappie! I think you all will like this one, I had fun writing it. It's nice and long, too, my longest chapter yet for this story. :D**

**I just realized I forgot to put up a disclaimer! So here it goes:**

**I'm not J. K. Rowling, and I did not invent this whole magical world, although I would be very happy if I did. But I did not, and besides, if I did, I most certainly would not be writing fanfiction now would I?**

**Anyway, a big thanks to those who put my story on their alerts or favorited it or reviewed! And of course a general thanks to anyone who is reading this story.**

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**She's Mine**

**Sirius's POV**

My heart and my stomach are completely betraying me, I have decided. Every time that Lily Evans walks into a room, they start to act up. This can't be good, I should probably go to Miss Poppy and have her check me out, maybe there is something seriously wrong with my internal organs.

James hasn't talked to Lily since he said I could go for her. In fact, he seems to be purposefully avoiding her. He's been really down in the dumps, too. He doesn't laugh or joke as much as he used to. I wish I knew what was going on in his head, but the one time I asked him, he rather rudely told me to mind my own business. I felt he was probably too pissed off to want to hear me say that him being all mopey is my business as I'm his best mate and it's affecting me as well.

With James avoiding Lily, my life has become particularly odd. Lily and her friends have, for some reason, started spending a lot of time around us. And every time that Lily stands up to come over to us, James has to get up and leave. I'm getting pretty sick of it, to tell the truth. And I'm getting pretty sick of the way my insides are behaving around Lily. Why can't things go back to the way they used to be? They were so much easier to understand. James was head over heels in love with Lily, who despised him, and I was merely a bystander who sometimes egged them on a little bit. OK, more than a little bit. But now James doesn't talk to Lily, Lily and I actually get along, and currently all my organs have decided to freak out on me. Oh, for an easier life.

But I'm just scratching the surface with our petty problems. The Death Eaters are growing in numbers and the murders are becoming more frequent and more public. This puts me in a precarious situation. I come from a family of purebloods who consider themselves to be all high and mighty just because of their so-called pure blood. I'm also best friends with a blood traitor, James Potter, and growing closer to a certain emerald-eyed Muggle born. My fine brother Regulus seems to be quite keen to make himself part of this whole debacle, and that means that we'll be on separate sides – not just different houses now, but this could be a life or death thing here, and I'm not just being dramatic about this. I don't need to be dramatic to make this situation dramatic; it's doing that just fine all by itself.

Oh, I see Lily and her friends standing up to come over here. Why do they have to? I don't mind, except that they drive away my best mate. And sure enough, James quickly stands up as soon as he notices the girls drawing closer to us. I stand up too, and reach out a hand that I place on his shoulder.

"James, mate," I say quietly, so that only he can hear. "Stay, please. You can't keep avoiding her forever." James looks at me, but I think he can read the pleading look on my face. I think he's a bit shocked – I am never the one to plead. He shrugs and sits back down. Lily, I can see, is looking more than a little apprehensive that James is staying with us.

Lion Girl – yes, I do know her name is Leona, but I think Lion Girl is a way cooler name – sits right next to Remus. I think there's something going on between them that they're not telling anyone. But maybe it's just my hyper imagination hoping that Remus could finally let his guard down around a girl. Peter scoots nervously away from her. I don't blame him, she's known just as much as Lily for her fiery temper. Lily sits across from me, and she flashes me the dazzling smile I've come to expect her to bestow upon me. I grin cockily back, and I think I see a slight roll of her eyes, but she can't help but smile a bit more. James who is sitting next to me can't seem to look at Lily. She glances at him and then looks questioningly at me, eyebrows raised. I shrug my shoulders discreetly, but she makes an angry face at me. She is scowling so fiercely at me, I figure I should probably give her what she wants. I mouth,

_I'll tell you outside._

I get up and stretch lazily. "I think I'm off to raid the Kitchens," I say, winking at Lily. James looks desperately at me, but I give him a look that says quite plainly, _it's your problem, not mine, _and swagger over to the portrait hole. I lean up against the wall of the corridor outside the portrait hole. Several times the Fat Lady gives me a questioning look, but finally Lily climbs out the portrait hole as well.

"So, what's going on?" She instantly demands, her hands on her hips. "Potter hasn't said one thing to me for a week."

Why does it hurt me that she's wondering why James hasn't talked to her? I brush away that insecurity and grin at her.

"What? Are you disappointed that he's finally given up on you?" I ask, raising an eyebrow.

"What? No, I most certainly am not!" Lily exclaims, looking flustered. "I just was wondering what was – oh never mind." She finishes in an unsatisfactorily way. I shrug at her, trying to pretend I don't give a damn what she thinks and turn around and begin walking down the hallway. Pretty soon I hear the clattering of shoes on the stone floor and Lily catches up to me.

"I'm coming with you," she says simply. My heart does a little happy beat inside my chest.

"Why?" I ask, trying to hide my pleasure that she wants to spend time with me.

"I um, well, I've never been to the Kitchens before," she says.

"You're lying," I grin at her.

"What? No, I'm not," she says hastily. I give her a look. "Ok, how do you know I've been to the Kitchens?" She demands, frowning at me.

"Ellen," I say simply. I hear Lily make a harrumphing noise beside me. She really is quite as dramatic as I am. I grin at the thought of the two of us being similar in a way.

"So why are you coming with me?" I know I make her uncomfortable; I might as well make the most of it. I guess I kind of get a kick out of it. Call me what you will, I call it fun.

I am not disappointed. Lily blushes, but she says quietly, "Because I actually kind of enjoy your company, compared to Potter." I can barely keep myself from beaming at these words. What stops me is the slight squirming in my stomach as I think of James and how I'm betraying him now. I tell myself I'm just befriending her so that she can get to know James.

"What about your friends, Ellen and Lion Girl? Wouldn't you rather spend time with them?" I ask playfully, knowing full well that my use of "Lion Girl" will get Lily worked up.

Once again I am not disappointed. Lily frowns at me, her eyes flashing. "Don't call her that!" She orders me. "You know her name, why don't you use it?"

"Because I love getting that reaction out of you, Evans," I tease her.

"I can't believe I just said that I actually kind of enjoy your company, you are an insensitive git," she storms at me. Ouch. She stops and turns on her heel, beginning to prance back down the corridor away from me.

"No, Lily, stop, come back," I say before I can stop myself.

"Why?" She says scathingly, turning around to glare at me.

"Because I want you to," I say simply. I see her blush again and I know she's going to give in. Why does that make me so happy?

"Oh, alright," she agrees and walks back towards me. My heart bounces happily in my chest. I wish it wouldn't.

As we walk down towards the Kitchens, I find myself in an engrossing conversation with Lily. She really is quite bright, and she cares fiercely about her friends, something I definitely consider an essential requirement. I enjoy her company, I feel like I can tell her anything. As we chat, I notice that I'm walking close to her, sometimes my hand brushes against hers. I can tell that she is almost as nervous as I am. This is weird; we're probably two of the most confidant people in this school (not including James), and we make each other nervous. I smile at the thought of this. I don't know why.

I tickle the pear painted in the bowl of fruit and we step into the Kitchens. Instantly we are supplied with Butterbeer by the house elves and I take her over to the fireplace where there are a few stools placed around the flames. We sit down next to each other.

"So, Lily," I say as I pop open my Butterbeer. She smirks at me.

"So, Black," she says sassily, opening her Butterbeer as well. I look at her, giving her a dramatically disbelieving and hurt look.

"What? You and your friends have been spending time with us and you still have to call me by my last name?" I pretend to look majorly wounded. She blushes. She is so cute when she blushes. Wait! No, I did not just think that. She's James's.

"I don't know, I didn't know it bothered you," she says.

"It mortally offends me, actually," I say pompously. She rolls her eyes; she's beginning to relax in my company. "Come on, we're friends, call me Sirius."

"We're friends?" She asks, looking uncertain.

"Well, what do you call it?" I ask. She shrugs and grins at me.

"Alright, Sirius, friends?" she says, reaching out her hand for me to shake. I love the way my name rolls off her tongue.

"Oh, come on," I wink at her. "Shaking hands? That's too formal for friends, Lil." She looks surprised at my words, and then blushes furiously as I wrap my arm around her shoulders and hug her close to my side. My heart and stomach are light as air and my brain feels kind of fuzzy being this close to her.

"James's would not approve," Lily says, looking shifty when I let go of her. I feel like saying I don't care about James, but I know I do. I can't do this to him. Why are my heart and my head saying two completely opposite things? They are confusing me so badly!

"Ah, well," I say, shrugging. I don't know what to say for once. I lean back on my stool and grin at her. That's what I can do, just grin and joke it off. Like it means nothing to me.

"I've gotta help him somehow," I say. I don't even know what I mean by that.

Instantly I know I said the wrong thing. Lily's face darkens and she chucks her Butterbeer bottle away from her, where it smashed on the floor. She stands up so that she towers above me as I still sit on my stool, and her eyes flash at me menacingly. I cower slightly in my seat. I don't normally cower from anybody, not even my mother, but Lily is _scary _when she's like this. All of a sudden, I admire how James laughs it off when she gets so angry at him.

"So that's what this is?" She shrieks at me, her face bright red with anger. "This is just some clever ploy set up by the two of you! You pretend to befriend me and then try and convince me to go out with Potter!" She turns on her heel and marches toward the fruit bowl entrance, the house elves scurrying out of her way.

"No!" I cry, jumping up and following her. "Lily, no, that's not what it is!" Lily is almost at the entrance. "Lily, please, listen to me! James and I didn't plan this, I really, Lily!" I say desperately. Her hand is on the doorknob. "Lily, look at me!"

She turns around and glowers at me. "What, Black?" She spits at me. I hate how she says my name like that. So full of spite.

"Listen to me," I say as I stand in front of her. I can't believe I'm begging her to listen to me. Who am I and where did the cool, calm, and collected Sirius Black go? What is she doing to me? "James had nothing to do with this." I try and make her see the truth in my eyes.

"Right," Lily drawls sarcastically. "And why should I believe you?"

"Because, because," I stutter, not knowing what to say. And then, I don't know what made me do it. But I kissed her. I kissed Lily Evans. Full on the lips. I swear I didn't mean to. But I am glad I did. It is as if a million emotions are being let out of me at once; I am so full of feelings I think I might burst. Oh Merlin. This is what kissing somebody is supposed to feel like.

I break the kiss and pull away, and I actually feel scared, scared of how she will react to me. I've never felt like that with any other girl I've kissed. I've always been in complete control of my emotions. It was never me that was scared or got hurt in the relationship. I'm just not like that. Except with Lily Evans, it seems. She is looking at me, but her face has softened, and though she is still red, I can see it's not from anger anymore. A small smile is playing on her lips, but she looks uncertain.

"Sirius?" She whispers. Her hand floats up to her mouth and she touches her lips. She looks like she can't quite believe what just happened. I can't quite believe what just happened. Suddenly I feel incredibly insecure. I can feel my ears turning a faint pink, and Sirius Black, never, _ever _blushes. Except after he kisses Lily Evans, apparently.

"I – I'm sorry, Lily," I say hesitantly. "I didn't mean, I mean, well, I don't know what I mean." I finish lamely and look at the floor in front of her feet, expecting her to explode at me.

Next thing I know, she is standing close to me, very close to me, too close to me. I can see her freckles that I never noticed before splashed lightly over her nose and across her cheeks. I can see that her emerald eyes are flecked with gold. I can't think, my brain is groggy from the kiss and from her being too close. She lifts her hand and I think she might slap me, but then she rests it gently against my cheek and leans closer to me. I feel my eyelids flutter closed as her lips brush lightly against mine. Without really thinking, I wrap my arms around her and pull her closer to me, deepening the kiss as I do so. I can't believe this is happening, my heart is beating wildly in my chest and my stomach seems to have disappeared. When she pulls back, I open my eyes to see that her emerald eyes are no longer filled with anger but with laughter. I grin back at her, feeling my confidence return.

"Well, Lily Evans, I just wanted to do that. Does that convince you?" I tilt my head to the side and smile widely.

"Well, just about," she says.

"Just about?" I repeat. "Not fully?"

"No, but this will," she says quietly and then leans closer to me and kisses me again. I swear that kissing Lily Evans is the best thing in the world. Everything around me disappears; it's only her and me. I'm lost in my own head. I'm lost in our kiss. I can't think, I almost can't breathe. This is amazing. You know that fireworks analogy? They are right. When you kiss the right person, fireworks really do explode and fire leaps between your lips. You feel light and fluttery. You feel amazing. You feel perfect. I don't want this to ever end. I could kiss Lily Evans until the day I die, I am certain of it. But she leans away from me. I keep my arms around her so that she can't go too far away from me. Her arms are still wrapped around me as well.

She stares into my eyes and I feel like she is reading my soul.

"Sirius," she whispers, and I feel tingly at how she says my name.

"Lily," I reply. Suddenly I see worry flood her beautiful eyes.

"Oh, Sirius," she says. "What are we going to tell Potter?" She seems a little hesitant at bringing him up. I feel a black cloud darken over me and the lightness I felt at kissing her slips away. I lean my head down and rest it on her shoulder.

"Damn," I say hoarsely. "Damn, damn, damn." I can't think of anything else to say. My best mate. I just betrayed my best mate. I really am a horrible person. I may have been sorted into Gryffindor, but I really do belong in Slytherin. I am a back stabber. I can't believe myself.

"Sirius," comes Lily voice between my agonizing thoughts. She lifts my head off her shoulder and looks into my eyes. "It's not your fault. And why can't we be together? Potter doesn't have a chance with me, he knows that. Now you, I'd like to give you a chance." She says it softly, but I hear every word. I don't know what to do. I just made my life a million times more complicated than I ever thought possible.

"Lily, I can't" I say croakily. "He's my best mate. Best mates don't do this. They just don't."

"Well, I want to," she says determinedly.

"Lily, I want to, too. I want to more than I've wanted anything in a while. But I just can't betray James like this."

"You're going to let him come between this?" Lily was looking hurt now. Shit. I don't want to hurt her. But now that I think on it, either I hurt James, or I hurt her. I can't get away from this situation without hurting someone.

"Just don't tell him for a bit, break it to him slowly," Lily says.

"I can't deceive James like that," I say.

"Well, then," Lily says and turns around to exit the portrait hole, but not before I can see that she's about to cry. She's walking away from me. I can't let her walk away from me. I reach out my hand quickly and take hold of hers.

"Lily." I say when she turns around and fixes me with her emerald stare. "Alright, I'll do it. But I have to tell him, I just need to work up the courage. So…" I feel like such an ass saying this, "Can we keep this on the down low until I do?" I search her eyes desperately.

A smile breaks over Lily's face. "Of course," she grins, and then kisses me again. I never want her to stop. For a fleeting moment, while I'm kissing Lily, I don't mind that she's supposed to be James's girl. Because right now, she's mine.

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**A/N: They weren't supposed to kiss this soon, but they were clamoring for it to be now, so I gave in. **

**You know what to do…review!!**


	6. What Did She Do To Me?

**A/N: Thanks to everybody who reviewed! I love getting back feedback, and it seems like most of you are enjoying the story so far. I'm glad you are. But if you have any suggestions, I'm willing to listen. **

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**What Did She Do To Me?**

**Lily's POV**

I walk dreamily into my dormitory. A smile is plastered on my face and there's no way it's leaving anytime soon. Completely oblivious to everything, I meander over to my bed, throw my arms out and fall backwards onto my mattress, grinning like a love sick idiot. Wait, I am a love sick idiot. OK, maybe I'm not in love, well, maybe I am, but not _in love, in love_. Whatever, I'm speaking babble now, but you know what I mean.

"LILY!" I hear a voice crack through my musings. "What in the name of Merlin is wrong with you?" I sit up and see Leona staring, open mouthed at me. My gaze then turns to Ellen, who is looking equally dumb struck.

"Wrong with me?" I ask, completely nonplused. "What makes you think there's anything wrong with me?" There's nothing wrong with me, in fact, everything is perfect.

"Um, maybe the fact that you are grinning like an idiot, and completely ignored Elle's and my salutations," Leona suggested, eyebrows raised in what I can only assume is disbelief at my weird behavior.

"Oh," I say and try to stop smiling. I can't, the smile instantly returns. "I'm sorry I didn't hear you."

"OK," Ellen says, sitting down on my mattress beside me. "What has happened to you?"

I giggle. Yes, I, the composed and dignified Lily Evans actually giggle. Leona slaps her forehead and Ellen's eyes widen.

"Who did you kiss?" she demands.

"Isn't it obvious?" Leona snaps. Why does she always have to be so angry?

"No, it's not." Ellen replies. "Or, well, not to me."

"It's _Black_," Leona says with distain dripping from those two simple syllables. Ellen's eyes widen.

"_No_," she whispers. I smile even bigger than I have been.

"Yes," I squeal. I turn to Leona. "And why exactly is that such a bad thing?" I demand of her.

"Because, Lily," says Leona in a pretend patient voice of one explaining that one and one is two. "Potter is in love with you. Black is Potter's best mate. That's just a recipe for disaster."

"How so?" I ask, even though I know the answer.

"Look," Ellen says softly, putting a gentle hand on my arm. "I know you don't like Potter, but think of Black. You're putting him in a very awkward position. You're asking him to choose between you and Potter." I sigh and slump down.

"But what am I supposed to do?" I ask. "Just act like I don't have feelings for him?"

"Well, I don't know, but honestly, Lily," Ellen says. "How on Earth did you get yourself into this position? You are supposed to be the one who is level-headed and mature and always making the right decisions of the three of us. What happened to that?"

"I can't always be that one," I say defensively.

"Look, Lily, I guess I don't disapprove of this situation" Ellen says and Leona snorts disbelievingly. Ellen turns to her, "I really don't, Leona." She turns back to me. "Lily, I'm going to support you in this. Only," she says, raising a hand as Leona opens her mouth to say something, "because you are my best mate and I think best mates should stick together." My happy smile returns to my face and I hug Ellen gleefully.

Leona is looking down right pissed off. "Thanks, Ellen," she says sarcastically. "Now you made me sound like the jerk."

"Hey, guys," I say, crossing my legs on the bed and leaning back on my hands. "Calm down."

"Calm down?" Leona demands. "Lily, this is a disastrous situation and you're asking me to calm down?"

"It is not a disastrous situation," I say stubbornly.

"Will you try to grasp the concept that Potter is in love with you and Black is his best mate?" Leona frowns theatrically at me.

"The concept is grasped, _mother_," I say, my voice dripping with sarcasm in the last word.

"So, this is base treachery," Leona points out. I really don't need her to tell me that, I already know that. She's only making me feel worse about myself.

"It's not quite base treachery," I say in an unconvincing voice, tilting my head from side to side, trying to persuade myself as well as her. Leona plants her hands on her hips and glares at me. I have to admit that I cower away from her slightly. Leona is scary when she is this mad.

"Ellen!" Leona says sharply, rounding now on poor Elle. "Will you please support me in this and help me persuade this crazy lady here that she is doing the complete insane?"

Ellen looks around nervously. I know she doesn't want to side with either Leona or I. I don't want her to have to. It would have been better if they never knew about Black, I mean Sirius and me to begin with. The problem is that they are my best friends and can read me sometimes even better than I can myself.

"I don't really think it's that big of a deal, Lea," Ellen says in a tentative voice.

"Not that big of a deal?" Leona practically screeches.

I stand up quickly and put a hand on her shoulder. "Leona, please, don't scream. You'll get the whole of Gryffindor interested in what is going on right now, and really, the last thing I need is the whole school knowing about this."

"Lily," Leona continues storming on in her verbal attack of me as though she never heard me. "I want you to walk right down into that Common Room and tell Black that you're not down for this atrocity, and you won't make him have to choose between you and Potter."

I stare at her incredulously. "Atrocity? Leona, what is wrong with you? And not down with it?" I say disbelievingly. "But, but I am down! I really want this, Lea. I do. Sirius is nice to me, and I love spending time around him. I love kissing him. But that's beside the point. The point is I like him and he likes me. It's not my fault his best mate is into me. That's his problem."

"Yes, but if it's Potter's problem, that makes it automatically Black's problem, and in subsequence, yours." Leona says.

"Look," I say to Leona. I just want to convince her of this. "We were going to keep it on the down low for a while until Sirius can think about how to approach Potter."

"Leona," says a quiet voice from behind me, and I see Ellen sitting there, staring intently at Leona. "Can you please let this go? Lily really wants this, and I want to stick with her through this. She can't help who she likes." Leona looks at Ellen for a full five seconds looking as though she can't believe what she just heard. After a while though, she lets the fight go out of her.

"Alright, Lily," she says to me. "I'll stick with you through this whole thing, even though it's simply a recipe for disaster. Just don't come running to me when Black breaks your heart." I feel sick at the thought of Black – Sirius – breaking my heart, but I push that thought away. We're barely together; he can't be close to breaking my heart. Besides, I'm smarter than that; I would never let myself get that involved with a guy.

**Sirius's POV**

I feel sick. Sicker than I've ever felt before, including that time I ate uncooked frog spleens on a dare from James (Remus told me not to do it, and Peter gave me a round of applause when I did). I can't believe I'm doing this to James. My head feels heavy and my heart must be filled with lead, it's having such a hard time beating. As for my stomach? It's killing me. My whole body has started a revolution against me, and it's all my bloody fault. Merlin. How in the world did I get myself into this mess? I think about James and my heart drops right through my stomach and out my feet. I think about Lily and my heart soars and I have a smile lighting up my face. I must be di-polar, or whatever it is that Muggles say.

I just went to bed when I came back from the Kitchens. I let Lily go back first and then wandered the halls for a while until I felt it was safe to return to the Gryffindor Common Room. But as soon as I saw James, I felt completely and utterly sick. I must have looked bad, too, because Remus asked me if I was feeling OK. I said no and that I was going to bad.

So now I'm lying on top of my sheets, the hangings closed around my bed, staring at the canopy above me, hashing and rehashing this whole situation in my mind. I feel like beating my head on a wall. Stupid, stupid hormones. Why does Lily have to be so beautiful and kind and witty and just perfect? My heart aches when I think about her. And since when do I feel this strongly about her? Just the other day she was simply the object of James's affection. And now? My feelings are all jumbled up. But, now that I think on it, maybe she wasn't always just the object of James's affection. Maybe she meant something more to me and I just never realized because of James. But maybe somebody jinxed me to start thinking like James or something. That's ridiculous, I know, but what else can be the explanation of this?

But then the memory of kissing Lily rushes back to me and I can't help but smile. I remember how her soft lips felt on mine, how her breath was gentle on my cheek, how her eyes lit up after we kissed. Something can't be bad if it feels so good, right? I sigh dramatically, even though there is no one around to impress. So I raise my hands to my head and start to massage my temples gently. I have a headache as massive as Mt. Everest. I don't know what I'm supposed to do now.

Somebody opens the dormitory door and I hear footsteps enter the room. Then I hear the very last voice I want to hear at the moment.

"Sirius?" Says James's voice. "Are you alright? You were looking pretty bad just a minute ago." He stops talking but I don't reply. "Did you eat something bad in the Kitchens?" Again I don't reply. "Well, if you want to pretend to be asleep, go ahead," his voice sounds disappointed, but I continue to lie silently on my bed until I hear James's feet walking out the dormitory and the door close behind him.

I slap myself repeatedly on the forehead. Why did I let myself get into this predicament? Why, why, WHY? I roll onto my side and stare at the hangings around my bed. I used to love the color of these hangings. I still do, as a matter of fact. I love looking at them and thinking how I'm the first Black to look at these hangings instead of emerald green ones. As the color of the Slytherins' hangings flashes through my mind, I am forcibly reminded of something else emerald green. Something that I love to look at, that I could gaze at forever. Lily's eyes, to be precise.

I squeeze my eyes shut. I hate myself. What am I doing? To either of them, for that matter? I'm betraying James by kissing Lily and I'm hurting Lily by going out with her behind everybody's backs. Wait, are we going out? I don't know. I just told her that we would keep it on the down low. What on the down low? I am such an arse. I wonder what Lily is doing right now? Is she in her dormitory, staring at her hangings like I am, stressing over the situation? Is she even thinking about me? Maybe those kisses didn't mean as much to her as they meant to me. Maybe I'm just going to drive myself insane if I keep this up. I need a reality check. I mean, seriously, what is wrong with me? I'm going totally bonkers. I've spent the good part of half an hour thinking about this girl. _What did she do to me?_

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**A/N: You know what to do – REVIEW!**


	7. This Is Perfection

**A/N: New chapter! Record timing. OK, maybe not, but still, it's soon, thanks to **_**someone **_**who told me I'd better update. **

**Thanks to my reviewers, who are very supportive of this story – I love you all, and thank you for taking the time to critique my story.**

**And thanks to everyone who favorite, alerted, or just plain read!**

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**This Is Perfection**

**Lily's POV**

For a moment when I wake up, I can't remember why I have a silly smile dancing on my face. Then it comes crashing back into my mind: following Black (no, Sirius, he asked me to call him Sirius, besides, if we're dating – are we? – of course I should call him by his first name) out of the portrait hole, going with him to the Kitchens, and then, the most unbelievable thing of everything, _kissing him. _My smile widens at the memory. They had been perfect kisses, the best I've ever had. Not that I've kissed that many boys – ever since Potter decided to pursue me, all of the other boys have considered me "off limits". And now? I really am off limits. I think. I'm not really sure what's going on between Black – no, Sirius – and myself. The happy smile falters a little.

"Oi!" I hear someone shout. I sit up and stare groggily around the room to see Leona, fully dressed in her school robes (I notice she's even got her shoes on), standing by my bed, with her hands on her hips.

"_Please _don't tell me," she says in a pained voice. "_Please _don't tell me you're still smiling because Black kissed you?" At the sound of his name, I smile more. I feel like slapping myself on the forehead. Why am I acting like such a bloody lovesick fool right now?

"And what if I am?" I ask defensively

Leona rolls her eyes. "Because," she says in a plaintive voice, but she is cut short.

"Remember what you agreed to, Leona?" Ellen says from her bed, where she is pulling a purple, blue, and white striped stocking onto her left foot.

Leona harrumphs but turns away from my bed and strides over to her school bag, which she hoists onto her shoulder. "Fine," she snaps. "I'm going down to breakfast. You're going to be late." She adds.

"Leona, wait," I say, jumping out of bed to stop her, but the ends of her robes are already flashing through the doorway. I sigh dramatically and lie back down on my bed and close my eyes. I just want to go back to sleep, it's too early to deal with anything right now. Someone pokes me in the side.

"Stop it," I squeal, not opening my eyes.

"No, I won't stop," says Ellen's voice. "It's morning, you need to wake up."

I roll over and open my eyes again. It's _way _too early to be awake. Ellen pokes me again, repeatedly.

"OK, OK," I say hurriedly, sitting up and starting to find my robes. "I'm up, alright?"

After a few moments of searching, I swear. "Damn, all of my robes are dirty, I forgot to send them to the house elves to clean them."

Ellen stares at me. "You really are head over heels right now, aren't you?" She asks in amazement. "You never forget anything, much less sending your robes off to be cleaned."

"Alright, alright," I moan, "just don't tell Lea, OK?"

"Of course I won't," Ellen says and picks out a set of robes from her closet. "Here, you can wear some of mine," she says, tossing them to me. I pull them over my head gratefully.

"Thanks a million, Elle," I say.

"No problem," she grins at me. Then she giggles. "So," she says, "now that _Lion Girl – _" I smile at that, "is gone, tell me!"

I look at her perplexed. "Tell you what?"

"About the kiss, you dork!" She says as though it is the most obvious thing in the world.

I can't help but grin and I close my eyes, remembering it. "It was amazing," I say, my eyes still closed. "It made me want to fly!"

"You know," Ellen says thoughtfully. "Now that I've had a bit of time to get over your not liking Potter, I kind of think that you and Black would be cute together."

My smile falters. "But I don't really know if we are together," I say. "I mean, he asked if we could keep it 'on the down low', but I don't really know what that means, or what exactly to keep 'on the down low'."

"That is a question," Ellen says, looking thoughtful, then she looks at the clock and her eyes widen. "Well, I guess you're just going to have to wait to find out, we need to go!"

I glance at the clock on the wall too, and realize that we're going to have to miss breakfast so that we could get to Transfiguration on time, and even that's iffy.

It is made impossible when we run into Peeves a floor down from the Gryffindor Common Room. After finally finding a different passage away from Peeves and towards Transfiguration, we are definitely late.

Ten minutes later Ellen and I swing into our Transfiguration classroom well after the bell rings to see Professor McGonagall staring at us sternly. I wince; I don't want to be told off, especially in front of the whole class.

"Miss Evans! Miss Platts!" She exclaims, her nostrils flaring. We are in trouble; her nostrils only flare when she's really angry.

"I expected better of you, Miss Evans," she says sharply. "And you would do well to remember that, if you want to keep your position as Gryffindor's female Prefect! I'm afraid I'm going to have to give you a detention. See me after class to arrange it."

I bow my head, completely embarrassed, knowing that my face is fully flushed. "I'm sorry, Professor," I say meekly as I make my way to my desk, but I do notice that McGonagall failed to tell off Ellen. I guess that's what comes of being a Prefect. But seriously? Detention? None of the Marauders ever get detention just for being a little late.

As I walk to my desk, I take a chance glance at the corner where the Marauders sit. They're all looking at me, but when I look at Black – Sirius, I mean – he winks at me, and my heart flips over and I smile a bit. Unfortunately, I think that Potter thought I was smiling at him because he suddenly smirks irritatingly at me. I scowl at him and see, to my amusement, his smirk falter and fall off his face.

I sit down in my seat and look forward, trying to focus my attention on whatever Professor McGonagall is talking about. It takes me a few minutes to realize that I haven't even taken out parchment or a quill. I wince, hoping that Professor McGonagall hadn't noticed, which I'm assuming she hadn't, as she hasn't said anything to me yet. I, trying to be as discreet as possible, lean slowly down to my bag, where I had dumped it on the floor, open it and gently take out my quill and some spare parchment. Yes! McGonagall noticed nothing! I straighten up, triumphant.

"Miss Evans, pray tell," came Professor McGonagall's sharp voice, "what you are smiling like a fool about?"

I know I turn crimson. "I, um, nothing, Professor," I say sheepishly. She looks at me sternly for five whole seconds (believe me, I am counting) before she turns away and starts lecturing again.

I feel my parchment warm beneath my hand. I know what this is – it's a handy little spell that some student invented, charm your parchment, and you can write notes to anybody in the classroom. Their parchment warms when you note appears. It's very clever, if you ask me. You don't even have to charm the other person's parchment for it to work. Plus, it just looks like you're writing down notes.

I look down and recognize Leona's spiky hand writing:

_Lily, are you telling me that you are so obsessed with that prat Black that you can't even concentrate in class? _

**No, **I Scrawl back furiously. How dare she accuse me of such?

_Right. So why were you grinning so stupidly then?_

**Well, if you really want to know, it was just stupid. I realized I forgot to get my parchment and quill out and I was just glad that I was able to get them out without Professor McGonagall noticing.**

_That's a pathetic excuse, Lily._

**It's not an excuse! I swear that's what it was about!**

_Right._

I can almost hear her sarcasm through the spiky words on the page.

**Hey, whatever. Girl, can you just lighten up about me and ****Black** **Sirius? It's not a crime to like a guy. And he likes me, too. What's so wrong with that?**

_I'll tell you what's wrong with it, EVANS. It's because he's such a ladies' man; he doesn't_ _care one iota about the girls he dates. I just don't want you to get hurt. Besides, he's betraying his friend. What kind of guy does that? _

Her words sound scathing even in ink. I sit back in my chair and frown at my parchment. (I would turn and frown at Leona, but I think I've caused Professor McGonagall to pay too much attention to me so far this class.)

**I take offense to that, **I scribble angrily. **What if he's going to change for me?**

_You're only fooling yourself. Black doesn't care about his girls, like I just said. He's just going to turn around and cheat on you as soon as he can then dump you. I just don't want to see you hurt._

**Well, I think I can trust myself on this one and think that ****Black**** Sirius really means it. I think he actually likes me. **

_I don't even believe that you really like him. You can't even call him by his first name. This is just some stupid crush. You'll get over it. _

**Leona. Just shut up about it. **I am really quite pissed right now. How dare she?

_WHAT did you just tell me?_

I know she can't believe I just told her to shut up. I can hardly believe it, except that I can see it in my writing.

**I told you to shut up.**

_Fuck you._

I know that this is the end of our conversation. Nothing more is going to be said. I shouldn't have told her to shut up, I know that. But honestly could she seriously be any less supportive of me? At least Ellen can be happy for me.

Damn. I hope I didn't just lose Leona as my friend. I love her, I really do. I just don't see why she has to take such a gloomy view of things. I look at my parchment, twirling my quill between my fingers. I should apologize to her. I really should. She is my friend, and like the Muggles say, "bros before hoes".

I chance another glance in the direction of the Marauders. Potter is writing on his parchment. I assume he's sending notes to Sirius (I got his name right!) like I was to Leona because I don't think he ever even takes notes. Sirius seems to feel my eyes on him because he looks up at me. His gray eyes connect with mine and I feel my heart beat faster and my face warm. He winks at me and I can't help but smile back at him.

When class ends, I walk up to Professor McGonagall's desk. Leona strides quickly out of the room, but I see Ellen hesitating at the door, waiting for me.

"Professor, I really am sorry," is the first thing out of my mouth. I blush brilliantly as I say it. Professor McGonagall is straightening her pieces of parchment and she taps them irritably on her desk in front of her. She looks sternly up at me.

"I am aware of that, Miss Evans," she says evenly. "But as a Prefect, you are one of the students who are supposed to be setting a prime example for other students, so I must punish you more strongly than others when you disobey rules."

"Yes, Ma'am," I say, looking down at the toes of my shoes sticking out from under Ellen's robes – she is a bit shorter than me.

"I wish you to come to my classroom this evening at eight o'clock and transfigure what the fourth years have left of their mice while trying to vanish them back into full mice; I need to use them again the next day for the Hufflepuffs."

"Yes, Professor," I mutter, but inside I'm glad it's not something worse. I can handle transfiguring mice, that's easy. Well, I don't really like mice, but still, I could be stuck doing something with Filch.

"Very well, you may leave for your next lesson," Professor McGonagall dismisses me.

"Merlin. First I get detention, and now Leona won't talk to me," I say to Ellen when we are out of ear shot of Professor McGonagall. "This day is really not going very well for me."

"Leona's not talking to you?" Ellen asks interestedly.

"No, well, I don't think so, anyway," I say dejectedly. "We were passing notes and I told her to shut up about Sirius." I am getting better at getting his name right! Small victory, I suppose, but the way my day is going, I need what I can get.

"Oh," Ellen says, nodding wisely. "She just needs a bit of time to get used to the idea of you and Black – um, Sirius – going out." And then to my complete surprise, she smiles.

"But I think the real reason," she says, and I can tell she's been dying to say this, "that she isn't particularly supportive of you and Sirius is because him kissing you totally eclipsed what happened between her and Lupin the other night."

"Her and Lupin?" I ask, interested. "Why, what happened?"

"I'm not sure, but I'm positive something happened," Ellen grins, "because she wouldn't shut up about him before you came in and told us that Sirius kissed you."

"Really? That would be awesome, I really hope that something did happen, maybe he could make her happier for us." Ellen and I look at each other and laugh. Leona is just that way – kind of pissy all the time.

"Well, hey, I gotta run to Divination," Ellen says, giving me a quick hug and dashing off down the hall.

I have off this period, so I meander down the hallway at a much slower pace than Ellen. Just as I am passing a certain classroom doorway that is slightly ajar, someone grabs the back of my robes and pulls me into the classroom.

I am about to lash out at whomever it is when I recognize the intense gray eyes an inch away from my face before Sirius is kissing me. I wrap my arms around his neck and kiss him back. He wraps his strong arms around my waist and pulls me closer to him. A huge swell of happiness wells up inside me and I feel as though I am flying. I forget about my argument with Leona and what she might be up to with Lupin. I can't help but smile. Sirius pulls back, but still keeps his face close to mine. He leans his forehead against mine and closes his eyes.

"Lily," he says, slightly huskily, "I thought about you a lot last night."

"So did I," I whisper back at him. "Think about you, I mean." I'm smiling like a fool. How does he do this to me? Usually I'm a calm and collected person, but as soon as Sirius comes within a five foot radius of me, I go to pieces. I smile and I can't think because my brain has gone fuzzy, my heart pitter patters and my breath catches in my throat.

Sirius slowly closes the small gap between us and then he is kissing me again. I feel as though I'm going to explode I'm so flooded with happy emotions. How can Leona disapprove of Sirius when he can make me feel like this? This is perfection; this is the way it's supposed to be. I can't believe that I'm this girl; I'm this girl that Sirius is kissing. I must be the luckiest girl in the world.

**Sirius's POV**

At ten till eight, I leave the Gryffindor Common Room to go down to Professor McGonagall's office. I knew that Lily had gotten detention earlier that day, so I managed to secure one for myself as well, taking the risk that we wouldn't be assigned to the same detention. And I am not disappointed – as soon as I walk into Professor McGonagall's office, I see that Lily is already here, talking to our Professor. I grin cheekily at her and wink (I promptly see her turn scarlet) before Professor McGonagall turns in her seat to see me.

"Miss Evans, Mr. Black will be joining you tonight, as he thought it would be amusing to transfigure Mr. Filch's broom into a lobster, which snapped at Mr. Filch's hands viciously and he had to have Madam Pomfry put them right," the stern professor says. As Professor McGonagall's back is turned away from Lily, she doesn't see Lily's smile creep unwillingly up her face and I can't help but smile too.

"I suppose you think it was funny, Mr. Black?" Professor McGonagall says tersely.

"Well, Minnie, I did think it was relatively entertaining, yes," I say, grinning at her.

"Mr. Black!" Professor McGonagall snaps. "As your Professor and Head of House, I must say that you may not call that disrespectful name."

"Yes, Professor," I say, shrugging. Professor McGonagall seems to think that that's good enough for her. (Although I am pretty sure that I notice a slight roll of her eyes).

"For your detention you will be transfiguring these bits of mice back into whole mice," she says, reaching under her desk and producing a box with wiggling mice tails, quivering mice ears, and a couple random little mice feet. I can't help but laugh at the sight of them. Me and the rest of the Marauders are exceptionally good at Transfiguration, I vanished my whole mouse on the first try back in fourth years. The Professor shoots me a glare before handing the box to Lily, who takes it tentatively.

Lily turns around and sits down at a desk and I pull another desk close to hers so that we can work on the mice together. I reach for a mouse tail and hold it up. It wriggles around as I dangle it and wave it around in Lily's face. She squeals and leans away, but she's laughing too.

"Black! I mean Sirius, stop it!" She giggles. She's so cute. And she's mine, all her cuteness is mine. Now to complete this perfection, I just need to tell James and have him be happy for me. Right. Like that's going to happen.

"Mr. Black, if you do that again, it will be another detention for you," Professor McGonagall says sharply.

"Yes, Miss," I say lazily, but I place the tail on my desk and point my wand at it. Instantly a small white mouse is adjoined onto the tail.

As Lily and I work with the mice, I find myself wishing that Professor McGonagall would leave us alone so that I can talk to Lily. But she stays firmly sitting behind her desk, grading papers. Or listening to our conversation. Whichever.

Finally, Lily conjures up a tail for the last mouse (whoever's mouse that was certainly isn't very good at Transfiguration; all they managed to disappear was its tail) and we are done. All the mice are squeaking around at the bottom of the box. I pick it up and hand it back to Professor McGonagall. She inspects our work and then nods at us.

"You may go now," she says sharply before turning back to the papers she is grading. I punch the air with my fist. As I turn around to leave her office (this time I definitely see her roll her eyes) Professor McGonagall calls after me, "And please, Black, no night time wanderings for tonight, I'm getting tired of giving you detentions for that."

As soon as Lily and I are out of the office, I reach my hand out and take her hand.

"So, where to, love?" I ask her, leaning over to plant a light kiss on her cheek.

"What? Aren't we going back to the Common Room?" She asks, looking quizzically at me. I laugh.

"Of course not, Lily! We're going to stay out and enjoy each other's company for a while." She really is so adorable, thinking we were promptly going back to the Common Room.

"But I thought Professor McGonagall just told you no night time wanderings tonight," Lily says. She is so cute! She is always so worried about the rules, it's just adorable.

"Well, I want to spend some quality time together, and we'll never get that in the Common Room," I say. "And besides, what fun is life without a little rule breaking?"

"I can't believe I've fallen for a delinquent," Lily says, squeezing my hand.

"But you've certainly never seen such a good looking delinquent, have you?" I ask cockily.

"No, nor one with quite such a big head," she smiles at me so I know she's joking as opposed to when she calls James a big headed prick. The thought of James makes my stomach turn over and I feel even worse as I think about what I'm about to do with Lily.

Trying to put James from my mind, I pear around the doorway of a classroom to make sure it's empty, which it is, so I pull Lily into it after me.

"Sirius!" She squeals, "What if we get caught?"

"So what?" I ask, sitting on the teacher's desk and pulling Lily to me and kissing her.

"But I'm a Prefect," she protests.

"That means they'll let you off easy," I murmur. She's not falling for it.

"No, they won't, you saw what Professor McGonagall did to me just for being late to her class! And Ellen didn't get anything." She looks at me, puzzled. "Who is 'they', anyway?"

"Oh, you know," I say, leaning down to kiss her again. "Just whoever catches us."

"Are you saying that someone is going to catch us?" Lily asks immediately.

"No, no one will catch us," I try to reassure her.

"But – "

"Shut up and kiss me," I say, pulling her close to me and kissing her. Instead of pulling back or talking some more, she lets me hold her close, wrapping her arms around me, one of my hands is playing in her gorgeous red hair and the other is resting gently on her cheek. Once again the fireworks are exploding in my mind, the fire leaps between our lips and I feel like I am flying. I feel weightless, I feel wonderful, I feel so calm and excited at the same time. I deepen the kiss. I feel like I can't get close enough to her. Being so close to her makes me feel tingly and lightheaded, and my stomach has the sensation of falling and my heart beats swiftly

"Sirius," Lily breathes. "Have you told him?"

"Told who what?" I ask still a little groggy from the kiss.

"Told Potter about us," Lily says, looking at me sternly.

"No, I haven't," I say a little reluctantly.

"Sirius!" Lily exclaims "Why not?"

"Um, because I haven't thought of a good way to handle it when my best mate slugs me," I say, a little peeved. It's only been one day! How was I supposed to have thought up a way to break it to my best mate that I'm going out with his long term, practically lifetime, crush? I'm terrified, to tell you the truth, of telling James that I betrayed him. James and Remus and Peter have been the first real friends I've ever had in real life. And James means the world to me – he's the best friend I could ever have asked for. And now he won't be, or he won't be when he finds out what's going on.

"Sirius, you need to tell him," Lily says forcefully.

"I will, Lily, I will," I murmur into her neck

"When?" She demands. Merlin, this girl never gives up on anything. Although maybe that's why I like her so much. I lean my forehead on her shoulder, slightly put out. This is not how this is supposed to be going.

"I'll tell him, Lily, I just need to figure out how to say it," I say. "But give a guy a break, Lil, it's only been one day that we've been going out and I need to find an appropriate way of breaking it to my best mate that – "

Lily leans in and kisses me, promptly shutting me up. I entwine a hand in her delicious hair and place my other one in the small of her back.

"Merlin, Lily," I whisper when she draws away from me.

"What?" She asks, smiling dazzlingly up at me.

"You blow me away," I say simply. She continues to smile up at me.

"Would you believe me if I told you that you do the same to me?" She whispers back at me. I grin down at her.

"Of course I would," I say slightly huskily before capturing Lily's lips in another sweet kiss. This is perfection as I've never known it.

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**A/N: I know Leona might be a little (OK, a lot) annoying, but she's just that way. Hopefully she'll get better, though. She just has to get used to the idea of Sirius and Lily dating. **


	8. Don't Call Me

**A/N: Here's a new chapter up because that same **_**someone **_**insisted I post again and I already had the chapter written. It may be a while before I update again, though. **

**Thanks to everyone who is reading my story!**

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**Don't Call Me**

**Sirius's POV**

I walk with the Marauders down to breakfast a few days after, eager for breakfast. I get to see Lily at breakfast! Although I still haven't told James about us.

"Come on, James, please?" I ask, making big puppy eyes at me.

"Padfoot, I'm not one of the many girls you've charmed – " my insides squirmed at the thought one particular girl I've charmed (if you can call it charmed), "so those eyes aren't going to affect me at all. And no, I refuse to throw a filibuster firework into Snape's cauldron." James says plaintively.

"Prongs, mate, are you going insane?" I demand.

"I wasn't the last time I checked, why?" James replies lazily, flicking a piece of dust off the end of his wand.

"Because you are passing up on an attempt befoul Snivillus," I say. Isn't this perfectly obvious? "And why are you calling him Snape? I thought he was Snivillus to us."

"Well, I'm turning over a new rock," James says.

"I thought the term was 'turning over a new leaf'," Peter says.

"We know that," I say a little sharply to him, Peter looks sad for a moment before Remus turns to him and claps him on the shoulder.

"That's alright, Peter, I forgot, thanks for reminding me," he says kindly. Peter glows at him. I'm not quite sure why we're friends with Peter, really. I mean, he's kind of out of our league. Even Remus, who isn't quite the female-charmer as me and James, is brilliant. Plus he's a Prefect, if that counts for anything.

"Anyway," I say, a little frustrated, "what are you talking about, James?"

"Oh, well, I noticed that Lily really hates me hexing or abusing Snivillus in any way, so I thought I'd stop and maybe she'll stop ignoring me."

My heart plummets at this. What did I just hear? Lily is my girl! Oh wait, right, James doesn't know that. He must have forgotten he gave me the go-ahead with Lily. I feel the pressure mounting to tell him, but I can't force the words out of my mouth, not with Remus and Peter there as well. I totally clam up and can't get a word out.

"Isn't that a good idea?" James asks, looking a little put out that I didn't exclaim about his marvelous plan.

"Oh, um, that's, er , great," I say. James looks at me weirdly. Merlin, he knows. He knows about Lily and me. That's why he's giving me that look. Why hasn't he punched me yet?

"What on earth is wrong with you, Padfoot?" He asks.

"Nothing," I say hastily.

"You're lying, tell me the truth," James pushes me.

"No, really, James, there is nothing the matter," I say, feeling horrible.

"Bloody hell, don't lie to me!" James outbursts.

"There's nothing wrong!" I say loudly, wanting to punch myself. I am such a jerk.

"Padfoot, please don't insult my intelligence. I'm your friend, friends know about their friends, and I know there's something you're not telling me," James says, practically glowering at me. This is the closest we've come to an argument in a while. The last time was when I was refusing to tell the other Marauders when I'd had a bad summer vacation at home (what with my mother being the bitch that she is and practicing the Cruciatus Curse on me, it wasn't very enjoyable) because I didn't want them to stop being my friend because of it. But I told them in the end, because I figured that friends tell, and I trust them. What about now?

"It's just my brother," I say, hating myself that I'm using this excuse. "I ran into his little Slytherin-arse yesterday."

"Oh," James says, looking concerned now, "Why is that bugging you this much?"

"Oh, I don't know," I say, playing my part well, "It's just I know he's going to join the Death Eaters – may have even joined them by now – and I hate to think that I'm actually related to such scum."

"Well, glad that's off your chest?" James asks, wrapping an arm around my shoulder. "Now are you ready to help me impress Lily?" Wow, he doesn't have much sympathy for me, does he? Not that I deserve it or anything.

My heart plummets again. How am I expected to lie like this? Oh, right, I'm not supposed to lie, I'm supposed to tell him about Lily and me.

"Yep," I say, plastering a fake smile on my face.

"Awesome!" James says and begins to chatter away about his plans while beside him, my heart is falling further through my body with each step.

My heart fully returns to its normal place when I walk into Potions and I see Lily there, beaming at me – in fact, it rises right through my body. Until I see James smiling roguishly back at her, thinking her smile was directed at him, anyway. Lily promptly scowls at him, leaving James quite confused.

Potions is excruciating, maybe even worse than the Cruciatus Curse, and I'm speaking from experience. What with watching Lily sitting with Ellen and Lion Girl and her casting looks my way, clearly disappointed that I hadn't told James yet and with James next to me, keeping up a constant stream about her, I thought I was going to go insane. My insides feel like I had eaten something with too many legs for breakfast. Or something that had come back to life and was crawling around my insides.

James catches Lily looking our way once again. He was bound to, she's been casting glances over at us – well, me – the whole lesson.

"Oi! Evans!" He stage-whispers across the room towards her. "Are your legs tired?"

"What?" She snaps, glancing at me. Did James notice that?

"Well, Flower, you've been running through my mind all day!" James says in a triumphant voice.

"_Don't," _Lily hisses, "call me Flower!"

It's totally noticeable this time when Lily frowns at me. Remus – always the observant one – looks at me, a quizzical expression on his face. I see him frown slightly and I immediately turn away from him. If he's figured me out, I don't want to see disappointment on his face. I couldn't bear it if my friends left me. So what am I going to tell James?

A little voice in the back of my head says _If he's really your friend, he won't mind that you're going out with the girl he likes._ But I know this is complete and utter rubbish.

As soon as Potions is over, Lily speeds out of the room after casting a look my way that clearly says _We need to talk._

Ignoring James and Remus who are calling after me, I toss my bag over my shoulder and hurry out after her. The first classroom I look in holds Lily, sitting on a desk and scowling at me.

"Sirius, you still haven't told him," she says, frowning ferociously at me.

"Love, I will, I just don't know what to say," I say, reaching a hand out to her, but she swats it away.

"I will give you two more days to tell him, and you'd better or I will stop seeing you. I don't want this to be a huge secret and I refuse to let it be." Oh Merlin. Two days? How on earth am I going to manage this?

"I'll do it, I swear I will," I say. I hate her being mad at me. I wish she would stop frowning at me like that, it's hurting my insides.

"You'd better, or else we're over," she says in a deadly voice.

"Babe, please don't say that. I promise you I'll tell him tonight," I say and try a hesitant smile. Her frown falters and falls off her face, replaced by a smile of her own, although she is still slightly red.

"Good," she says. "I knew that you would, I just had to make you say it."

"Good," I agree, "Now that we've got that cleared up – " I move swiftly towards the desk she is sitting on and capture her lips with mine. She responds readily, running her fingers through my hair and wrapping her legs around my waist. I place my arms around her and pull her closer to me.

"SIRIUS!" Oh Merlin, I know that voice. Lily and I jump apart, equally guilty looks on both of our faces. I turn to face the door way and see Remus standing there, his mouth open in shock.

"Sirius, what the bloody hell do you think you are doing?" He demands.

"Well, you see, Remus," I say, my voice shaking, but Lily interrupts me.

"What does it look like he's doing?" She demands.

Remus is still staring at me. "I thought I caught a glimpse of it earlier, but I never would have believed it of you, Sirius," he says and I can hear the disappointment in his voice. My insides craw and I wish more than anything else in the world that I could just vanish from this spot and never have to deal with this whole mess.

"I'll leave the two of you to talk," Lily says, sliding off the desk and walking out of the room. I grimace.

"I'm sorry," I say immediately after Lily closes the door. "I didn't mean it to happen, I don't know how it happened, really, it just sort of…did…" My voice trails off as the look of disappointment stays fixed on Remus's face.

"You don't have to apologize to me," Remus says bluntly and slightly coldly, "It's James you'll have to apologize to."

I hang my head and my shoulders slump down. "I know," I whisper. To my surprise, Remus pats my shoulder.

"But in my defense, I really like her," I say hastily, as though my really liking her will make the situation any better.

Remus raises his eyebrows. "I never thought I'd hear the day that you admit you _like _a girl," he says. "Thought a girl was hot, that she had a cute arse or nice boobs, sure, but you _like _Lily? Actually really _like_ her?"

"I think I do," I say faintly, not looking at him.

"Well, it'll be tough, mate, but you have to tell James," he says, and I don't hear quite the same amount of disappointment in his voice and I chance a look at him. His expression looks sympathetic, I think, but I'm not much one for reading expressions.

"I expect you to tell him tonight," Remus says, "But let's get to class now."

I follow Moony out of the room and along the corridor. I don't know what class I sit through next, or the one after that. All of my thoughts are focused on telling James. I try to find a moment where we can be alone, but someone is always around us, and for the first time in my life, I find myself wishing that the population of Hogwarts would leave me alone.

By the time we are in our Dormitory changing into our night clothes I am feeling a little panicky. After I puling on a pair of red plaid flannel pants, I glance at Remus while James's head is still in his own shirt.

_Help! _I mouth frantically, flapping my arms a bit, definitely feeling anxious. He nods and smiles encouragingly at me before turning to Peter.

"Hey, Pete, let's go to the Kitchens," he says. Little Petey looks up.

"Me?" He asks, looking very excited to be the one chosen to accompany Moony down to the Kitchens.

"Yeah, my furry little problem is catching up to me and I need some chocolate to satisfy it," Remus says as I beam at him, although inside I'm screaming because I don't want to be left alone with James. Well, I do, but it's going to be tough.

"Yeah, I'll come, too!" James says, immediately beginning to look around in his trunk for his invisibility cloak.

"NO!" Remus says quickly.

"What? Why?" James asks, looking up from his trunk, confused.

"I, um," Remus falters. He's not very good at coming up with excuses.

"I'm coming with you," James insists, pulling his cloak out of his trunk.

"James, no!" Remus says.

"You're being very weird, Moony," James says. "I know it's close to that time of the month right now, but do you really have to act so hostilely towards me?"

"Sirius has to tell you something!" Moony bursts out. Damn him and his big mouth. Prongs is looking quite confused at this point.

"You have something to tell me?" He asks me. "Well, what are you waiting for? Tell me!"

Remus grabs Peter's arm and hauls him out of the room and down the stairs towards the Common Room.

"So…shoot," James says, looking curiously at me.

"Prongs, mate," I say, and I think my voice is a bit shaky. "You're my best mate, right?"

"Of course," he says immediately, looking even more confused.

"I really, really am your best mate?" I ask.

"What is with you and Moony tonight?" He asks suspiciously. "You're both acting really weirdly. Actually, you've been acting pretty weirdly all day. So what's up?"

"Answer me: I really, really am your best mate?" I persist. I guess I just need him to say he is for one last time.

"Yes, Sirius, you're my best mate," James says. "How thick could you get, mate? It's kind of obvious."

I take a deep breath and feel myself shaking. All this for a girl? Is this really worth it? Of course it's worth it. Lily makes me so happy – just a smile from her can send me soaring. And I don't think I can bear to stand the disappointed look on her face if I tell her I didn't tell James. But my best mate? Is she worth losing my best mate over? She is. I think.

Without even taking a breath, I find myself saying quickly,

"Lily and I are kind of dating."

My head explodes and I find myself falling to the floor. I shake my head and sit up, a little out of it. James is looking down at me, his fist pulled back to punch me again, his face contorted in an ugly grimace.

"What did you say?" He demands asI get to my feet, my head throbbing. Damn, he can hit _hard._ Not that I wasn't expecting it, but it still hurts a hell of a lot.

"I said that Lily and I are dating," I repeat, knowing full well what is going to happen next.

WHAM! I find myself on the floor for a second time. Now my head is excruciatingly painful. A little dazed, I stand up again. James is staring at me, his fist pulled back yet again, but his mouth is slightly open. His eyes are flashing at me and I wince.

"I'm sorry, mate, I didn't mean –"

"Don't call me MATE!" James positively shouts. He turns on his heel and storms down the stairway to the dormitory.

I flop down on my four-poster and stare at the ceiling. I've screwed up big time. This is it, this is the end. I've lost my best mate. I almost feel like crying, I'm so devastated. But, born and raised a Black, I hold the tears back angrily.

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**A/N: This story may be a little bleak now because James is so mad at Sirius, and for good reason. **

**Please review and tell me what you think!**


	9. Unexpected News

**A/N: Thanks for reading this far! I'm having a bit of writer's block, so this may not flow so well. Please excuse me for that. **

**And a major thanks goes out to those who have reviewed this, I really appreciate that you can find the time to give me some feedback on my writing. I would love anything any of you would like to comment on – suggestions, critiques, ideas, whatever you feel like I can improve in. **

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**Unexpected News**

**Lily's POV**

When I awake the next morning, I see Leona getting dressed at top speed. As I have yet to work things out between the two of us, I know I have to get up. Ignoring my mind, which wants to go back to sleep, I drag myself hurriedly out of bed to confront her. I nearly fall over, but I stagger up right and stumble sleepily over to her. Why does the day have to begin so effing early?

"Leona?" I say, grasping her shoulder. She whirls around and when she sees me, she scowls.

"What? I wasn't even talking, Miss Perfect Prefect, so you can't tell me to shut up," she snaps.

"I didn't want to tell you to shut up, I just wanted to tell you – " But Leona spins on her heel and, her robes flying behind her, storms out of the room.

"Sorry for telling you to shut up," I finish in a whisper. Ellen, who is sitting on her bed, pulling a blouse on over her head, stands up as soon as her head pops out and, wriggling her arms into the sleeves, walks over to me.

"I'm sorry, Lily," she says, and I can hear the hurt in her voice as she says it. Ellen is too selfless of a girl to tell me that it's hurting her that Leona and I aren't talking. She's just too sweet of a person, but I appreciate it just the same. I walk over to my bed and close my eyes, letting myself flop face down onto the mattress.

"Elle!" I say, my eyes still closed. "What am I supposed to do?"

Someone sits down on my bed. I open my eyes to see Alice, one of the other girls who shares the dormitory with Leona, Ellen and myself.

"Oh, Lily!" She says, stroking my back. "What's wrong, hunny?"

"Leona won't talk to me anymore," I moan into the scarlet comforter.

"Why not?" Alice asks. I don't answer.

"Because Leona doesn't approve of Lily dating Sirius Black," Ellen says softly.

"What?" Alice asks, and I can hear the surprise in her voice. "You're dating Sirius Black, Lily? I didn't know that."

"Well, we've been keeping it quiet, but I don't know if I am anymore," I mumble into the comforter. "I told him that we wouldn't be if he didn't tell Potter last night, and I don't know if he did or not."

"Well, girl, the only way to know is if you get up and face the world today," Alice says. She really is very reasonable.

"I can't," I say. "I just want to go back to bed."

"Sweetie, I would love to let you do what you want, but you have to get up," Ellen says. Why do they both have to be so reasonable? I just want to go back to sleep.

After a few more minutes of them cajoling me to get up, I finally do so. When I finish dressing, the three of us head down to the Common Room. It's Saturday morning, so most of the Gryffindors are in the Common Room, lazing around. I scan the room until I find what I'm looking for – the messy dark hair and dark stormy gray eyes of Sirius Black. When I see him, he seems to feel me looking at him, and he looks up and a large smile breaks over his face, making my breath catch in my throat. I realize he's sitting alone – none of the other Marauders are sitting with him – and my heart beats faster. I don't know what to do, so I hover at the base of the staircase, looking at him. He stands up and walks over to me, slipping his hand into mine and kissing me on the cheek. My cheeks blush scarlet.

"Good morning, love," he says, not bothering to keep his voice down. I realize that most of the Common Room's attention is focused on us and I hear curious whispers break out. As he walks with me back to his seat, Ellen and Alice following in our wake, I hear a few of the whispers:

"Sirius Black?"

"The Sirius Black?"

"With Lily Evans?"

"But what about Potter?" One of the fifth years shouts at us. I chance a glance at Sirius and see his smile faltering, but he quickly hitches it back on his face.

"So did you tell him?" I ask quietly.

"Yes, I did," he replies in the same soft voice.

"And?" I prompt him, wanting to know what happened.

"And nothing," Sirius shrugs nonchalantly.

"But what happened?" I ask, "What did he say? Where is he?"

"I told you, love, it's nothing," he says. And then I see Potter sitting in a corner with Peter Pettigrew. He is scowling over at us and as soon as he sees me looking at him, he looks at me with pain written clearly in his eyes. I feel a slight pang, but only slightly. Potter has been bugging me for a year or so now, and I never said anything encouraging to him. He must have known all along that I didn't see him as the man for me. I look away from him quickly.

"So the two of you aren't talking?" I ask Sirius.

"Well, no," Sirius says evasively.

"Where's Lupin?" I ask him.

"He's not taking sides," Sirius shrugs.

"Doesn't this bug you?" I ask, but he simply shrugs again and I can't read a single ounce of his emotions. I guess I'm used to Potter, he never keeps any of his feelings quiet. But I'm not with Potter, I'm with Sirius – the most amazing boy ever. Sirius squeezes my hand and leans down to my ear.

"Fancy a walk?" He whispers in my ear. I grin up at him and then turn to Ellen and Alice.

"Sirius and I are going for a walk," I tell them, grinning widely, and they both smile at me and head towards a sofa together.

My heart is fluttering out of control as the two of us duck out of the portrait hole, my hand encased in Sirius's strong, warm hand. I am so lucky.

"So where are we going?" I ask.

"You don't want me to ruin the surprise for you, do you?" Sirius says, holding our clasped hands to his chest.

"Of course not," I agree, my heart pounding, my stomach feeling all over the place at the closeness of Sirius. I feel like I'm floating as I walk with him, hand in hand. We pass several students in the hallway and I notice that they all turn and watch us walk past, gaping at us.

"They're all amazed to see that I got such a great guy," I notice.

"No, they're not, love," Sirius insists. "They're amazed that I got myself such an amazing girl!"

"You're such a sweetheart," I say.

"Well, not to everyone," Sirius says, looking at me with such a ridiculously honest look on his face, I laugh.

"OK, well, to me you are," I say.

"You deserve it," he says easily.

"Now you're just trying to win me over!" I laugh.

"What, and I haven't already?" He asks, mock seriously.

I hit him playfully on the arm but he takes his arm and wraps it snugly around me, hugging me tightly to him.

"Now, now," he jokes, "play nicely, Evans!" I smile, because I can't help _but _smile in Sirius's presence.

Instead of heading down towards the Great Hall and the entrance way, where I expected to go with him, Sirius leads me in the direction of the tallest tower in the school – the Astronomy Tower.

"Sirius," I say hesitantly, when we reach the base of the spiral staircase, stopping walking so that our hands lose each other and Sirius walks a few steps beyond me. "What are you doing? That's the Astronomy Tower."

Sirius grins back at me, "You are very astute, yes, this is the Astronomy Tower." He takes my hand and tries to pull me forward. I stand my ground.

"But we're not allowed up there," I say, frowning at him. He knows I'm a Prefect!

"Oh, love, relax!" He says, turning to face me and taking me by the shoulders and beaming down at me. I feel my heart melt on the spot. But still, the Astronomy Tower is off limits!

"Sirius!" I say, trying to sound like I'm not melting on the spot. "It's out of bounds!"

"Oh, Lils," he sighs, but still smiles at me. "You are so concerned about the rules!"

"I have to be!" I say, slightly defensively. "I'm a Prefect!"

Sirius leans close to me and whispers in my ear (shivers go up and down my spine as he does so), "Break the rules, just this once?" He pauses and when I don't say anything he whispers, "For me?" That breaks me. I know he knows that I'm giving in.

"Resistance is futile, Evans," he says, winking at me. I tilt my head from side to side, trying to defy the inevitable.

"Oh, alright," I say, stepping forward. Sirius grins at me and takes my hand again as we begin to climb up the stairs.

Now I don't want you getting the wrong idea, but these stairs are steep! And there are a lot of them. And, well, I'm not exactly the kind of person who works out all the time or anything. So by the time we are nearing the top, I'm a little out of breath. OK, more than a little. When we finally reach the top and open the door onto the little area where the Astronomy students assemble their telescopes to observe the heavens, I place my hands on my knees and try and catch my breath.

When I finally look up, I let out a low breath at the beautiful scene. I can see the mountain tops stretching away from us, snow capping their high peaks and the sun glinting gold on them. The lake is gilded with gold as well from the sun, but the trees are a deep, dark green. The autumn morning air is crisp and stings my lungs as I breathe it in. Birds chirrup around the castle, singing lilting songs to the sun.

"It's beautiful," I whisper.

"I thought you'd like it," Sirius says lowly in my ear, making my hair flutter with his breath and sending goose bumps down my arms, standing behind me and wrapping his strong arms around me, holding me close and resting his chin lightly on the top of my head. I lean my head back on his chest and close my eyes, concentrating on the closeness of him and how I smell a faint scent of cinnamon and cloves wafting from him. I breathe deeply, eyes still closed.

Sirius and I finally go down to the Great Hall for breakfast. It's so late that there are very few people there when we walk in, Sirius with his arm around my waist and mine around his. Whispers have been following us all the way down through the castle as people see us together. I got several pretty nasty looks from a lot of girls – I can understand, if I saw one of them with him, I would feel the same way. I am glowing crimson – at all the attention, and with pride.

When we near the Gryffindor table, I see Potter stand angrily and storm from the Great Hall, dragging poor Pettigrew along with him, sending Sirius a nasty look. I glance at Sirius to see how he's taking this, but his eyes are totally unreadable. Sirius walks over to where Lupin is sitting and sits down next to him, me on his other side.

"Morning, Moony!" He says cheerfully, as though his best friend hadn't just given him the death glare, and begins to eat some eggs straight out of the bowl. Lupin looks at him calculatingly.

"Morning, Paddy," Lupin replies, piling more sausages on his own plate. He leans around Sirius to look at me. "Morning, Lily," he adds.

I smile. At least one of Sirius's friends is going to talk to me.

"Good morning, Remus," I say, buttering some toast and looking at Sirius who is still eating the eggs right out of the bowl.

"Sirius!" Remus says finally. "Would you please have some manners and just dish some out onto your plate like a normal person instead of eating right out of the bowl?"

Sirius looks at Lupin and shrugs. "Sure, if it bugs you," he says, and piles eggs on his plate.

The owl who delivers my morning post flies over to me with the newspaper tied to its leg. I untie the paper and the bird flies off as I open the paper.

Immediately I choke on the pumpkin juice I had in my mouth and start to cough. Sirius looks at me, alarmed, and pounds me on the back.

After I finally recover from the coughing fit, I look down at the paper again. The headline reads:

**Muggle-Born and Family Murdered by Unknown Dark Wizard**

"What is it?" Sirius asks. I mutely hand him the paper and he reads the headline.

"Bloody hell," he mutters under his breath.

I take back the newspaper and begin to read the story. It turns out that a Muggle-born witch, Leslie McAvery, who had graduated from Hogwarts two years previously, and her family were found murdered in their home on Friday morning when a few of their friends came over for a prearranged brunch. The newspaper claimed to not know the identity of the wizard who had done it, but I am sure that it is that one that calls himself Lord Voldemort. He has been gaining power and followers for a few years now, and it is beginning to look like we really might have an all-out war on our hands soon. The whole article was essentially uninformative and left a lot unsaid. I lay down the paper, my face grim, and stare straight in front of me. Poor Leslie and her family. This is so horrible.

Sirius lays a gentle hand on my arm.

"Love," he says tentatively, "Are you alright?"

I blink hard, still staring straight ahead, and swallow. All the wonderful feelings from this morning are chased out of my mind and I'm left with this harsh reality. Finally I nod, even though I'm not OK. What if this happens to my family? Granted I haven't gotten along with Petunia in a while, but my parents? I love them so much; it would be devastating if they were murdered. And it would be my entire fault if they are. My fault that I'm a witch and I brought them into this whole magical world. My fault that they lost their lives because of that. And I really would be upset if Petunia was murdered. I still love her, even though she thinks I'm a freak.

"Lily?" Says a hesitant voice behind me. I turn around to see Leona standing there. "Lily, are you OK?" She asks softly.

"Oh, Lea!" I say, and stand up to hug her. She hugs me back, squeezing me tight.

"I'm sorry I made you so mad at me! It all seems so trivial now," she whispers in my ear so that Lupin and Sirius can't hear her. I can tell that I'm not the only one trying to hold back tears.

"And I'm sorry I told you to shut up," I say, my voice breaking. "I didn't mean it."

When we break apart, both of us have tears shining in our eyes and on our cheeks. Leona laughs, even though we both know that there's nothing amusing about the situation at all.

"Isn't it sad how sometimes we need something like this to happen to make us realize how important our friends are? Especially when we were fighting over something so stupid!" She chokes out. I nod, wiping my eyes on my sleeve, and we hug again.

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**A/N: Review! You know you want to! Remember, I appreciate anything you would like to tell me. I want to make my writing better, and your evaluations will help me on that path. **


	10. Is That A New Hat?

**A/N: Hello to all my readers, and I hope you are having a fabulous day. I would have posted this yesterday, only my computer was failing me at the time, so I couldn't.**

**I just want to say thanks to those who reviewed (you know who you are!) and thanks to everyone who put this on their alerts or favorites! It makes me happy to know that there are people who enjoy reading my writing enough to be told when I'm updating my story.**

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**Sirius's POV**

It's been two weeks since the murdering of the McAverys and Lily seems to be recovering from the shock. I wish I could say that James's and my friendship is recovering as well, but it's not. It makes most of the entire population of Hogwarts uneasy, I can tell. I don't want to sound big headed or anything (well, I really am, so whatever) but with James and me not talking to each other, it makes class awkward. Normally we sit next to each other in class and don't shut up the entire lesson. Now we sit as far away as possible and the only time we look at each other is to cast the other a furious glare. Although, I have to say that the loss of my best friend is hurting me way more than I'm letting on. I've been laughing it off, but inside I'm torn apart every time I see him walk past me without a second glance in my direction. James was my first real friend. And now he won't even talk to me. Lupin has been great – he doesn't support my betrayal of James, but he puts up with me, and he's civil to my Lily. Peter – he flits between James and myself, never knowing which one to try and please, it's a bit pathetic, really.

It's Potions and Lily and I are sitting together. For the past two weeks we've been studying the theory of a particularly difficult potion, but today we are finally going to get a shot at actually brewing it. Professor Slughorn moves between us, pairing us up. I move instinctive towards Lily. Of course Slughorn doesn't notice this, instead, he booms:

"Black and Potter, you both have been very well behaved for a while in my class, so I'll actually let you work together this lesson!" He looks at us as though he is giving us a great gift. Usually, I would agree with him. Most of the teachers try as hard as possible to never let the two of us work on a project together. James shoots a very nasty look my way and says:

"Professor, if you don't mind, I'd rather work with _anyone_," he stresses the word, "besides Black."

"Very funny joke, Mr. Potter," Slughorn merely smiles at him and moves on. James is clearly fuming and I see Lily and Remus cast me apologetic glances. I get up, almost timidly, and move towards James, who doesn't acknowledge me at all, but simply starts setting up the potion ingredients.

"Um, James?" I say quietly so that the rest of the class, who I'm pretty sure is doing their best to listen, can't hear me.

"You can stir, Black," James snaps, without keeping his voice down. "Now just let me do the work." I frown, but I know that it's my fault that James isn't talking to me. But the continued use of my last name, and the bitterness in which he says it stings. I pick up the stirring stick and begin to slowly stir the orange liquid within.

"You know," James says after a very awkward ten minutes of silence between us, "You really are a good actor. You know, you had me convinced that you were different, that you cared, that you had a heart. But that just goes to show that you can never trust a Black."

"None of my family would ever go out with a Muggle-born," I say automatically, but I instantly regret my words.

'That's not exactly the point, now is it, Black?" James hisses.

"James, please, listen to me," I say, but James looks at me so ferociously that I stop talking and start paying attention to my stirring.

Finally I decide that we've got to talk, and I don't care what comes out of my mouth, but I have to tell him that I'm sorry. He's never even given me the chance to say that.

"James, I'm sorry. I really am," I say before he can interrupt me.

"I can see," James says scathingly and sarcastically.

"What do I have to say to get you to believe me?" I demand. I know I'm the one that wronged him, but I am getting tired of this attitude he's giving me. I know I'm being a prick, but I really think that he should forgive me.

"There's nothing you can say, Black," he snaps.

"Would you please stop calling me Black?" I ask testily. James doesn't reply.

Screw Potions. I hate this.

**Lily's POV**

I noticed that Sirius was attempting to talk to Potter during Potions. I also noticed that the conversation didn't go exactly well. My insides are eating me alive. If it weren't for me, the two of them would still be friends. It's all my fault. It's as easy as that. I know what I have to do – I have to talk to Potter. Even though talking to Potter is really the last thing I'd like to do, I know I have to talk to him. Maybe I could help sort some things out.

When we go to lunch, I lean over to Lupin and ask quietly, "Do you know where Potter is?" He looks up at me questioningly. I grimace and shrug.

"He's on the Quidditch pitch," he says quietly back to me. I sit down momentarily next to Sirius.

"I've got to go do something," I tell him, and he smiles and kisses me on the cheek.

"See you later, then?" I say, and he nods, his mouth full of steak.

I jump up and hurry out of the Great Hall and down the stone steps of the castle. Wrapping my cloak tight around me (it's October and really quite brisk) and scurry off towards the Quidditch Pitch. When I get there, I look up in the sky and see a solitary figure high above me, soaring through the crisp air.

"Potter!" I call loudly. I see his pale face look down at me briefly, but I can't see his expression. He doesn't come down to the ground.

"James!" I try again, thinking that he might respond more friendly if I use his first name. I see his pale face again, and I see it for a little longer this time. He seems to be considering me.

"Please, James, I need to talk to you!" I cry. Slowly he leans forward and tips the broom down until he lands softly on cold grass.

"I'm only talking to you because it's you," he says, as though he has to clear this up. I fight not to roll my eyes – my boyfriend's friendship is on the line, I can't ruin it by getting mad at Potter.

"OK," I say.

"Are you OK?" He asks. This doesn't make sense, and I think my face shows my confusion because Potter explains:

"About those murders. I know that it was a big shock to you. I mean, it was a big shock to us all."

"Oh," I say. I didn't want to talk about this. I'm still upset about it, but I know I can't dwell on it. "Well, I guess I'm alright," I say. "I mean, it was pretty horrible."

"It was," Potter agrees. We stand there in the cold, me beginning to shake with the cold.

"We ought to get inside," Potter says, noticing me shivering.

"I wanted to talk to you," I say.

"I know," Potter says.

"Sirius really is sorry," I say. I feel so stupid. I've never had a civilized conversation with Potter, and it's kind of awkward trying to.

"I know," is his unexpected reply.

"You do?" I ask, surprised.

"Yeah, I do. I know he never meant to hurt me like that. It just sort of happened. I understand, it's hard not to like you, you know?" Potter says. Now this conversation is quite sufficiently awkward.

"Anyway," he continues, "I have to make him hurt. Do you know what I mean?"

I look at him, astonished. "You _want _to make him hurt?"

"Well, yeah," he says, looking ashamed of himself. "Look, I know it's not very mature, but I can't help it. I've always thought that you would be mine eventually. So I'm hurt that it was him that got you instead of me, and I want to make him hurt like I'm hurt." Why does he insist on making this conversation quite so awkward?

"Well," I say slowly. "I guess I kind of do understand, but don't you think you've made him hurt enough?" I ask cautiously.

"That's something I'm going to have to ask you," he says simply. "Do you think he's hurt enough?"

I look right into his eyes. "Yes, I do."

"And you're not just saying this because you're his girlfriend?" Potter asks quickly.

"No, I know he's really hurting. He hasn't told me, but I know he's hurting. You're his best mate, James," I say. It feels weird to say James, but I figure I have to keep him on my good side right now. He has the grace to look slightly ashamed of himself.

"Look, I already said myself that it's incredibly immature," he says quickly, as though defending himself.

"And I already said that I understand," I say, slightly testily.

"I know he's hurting," he says under his breath, but I catch it.

"Look – " I start, but he interrupts me.

"I can't give it up just yet. It's just that I can't bear to see the two of you two together," he says. "It hurts so much."

I nod, shivering violently.

"We should get inside," he says and with his broom over his shoulder, begins to make his way across the frozen grass towards the castle and I follow.

"I'm sorry, too," I say as we walk across the grounds. Potter looks at me.

"What are you sorry for?" He asks.

"I feel terrible that I ruined your' friendship," I say.

"Lily," he says, stopping. I stop and he puts his hands on my shoulders and turns me to face him. "It's not your fault." I don't look at him.

"It is. If it wasn't for me, you two would still be friends," I mutter. He places a hand under my chin and raises it so that I look him in the eyes.

"I repeat, this is not your fault," he says sternly. "Don't for one second believe that this is your fault."

I grimace. "I'm still sorry," I say.

"I know you are, and I don't want you to be," he says.

"Well, do you think you can forgive Sirius?" I ask hesitantly. Potter looks at me for a long time. He finally nods.

"Thank you," I say quietly, and I hug him. He stands stiff at first, but then wraps his arms around my shoulders and hugs me too.

"But maybe just not yet," he says quietly. I look at him, frowning slightly. "Look, Lily," he says, "You're hard to get over, you know? I mean, you're just so perfect, it's hard to let you go."

"I'm not perfect," I say automatically. I look at him, but I know this is the best I'm going to get, so I nod. Merlin, I wish this could be easier.

**Sirius's POV**

In Care of Magical Creatures (Lily isn't in this class) I momentarily forgot that James isn't talking to me and secured myself a detention by pissing off a Dryad (a nymph that lives in an Oak tree) that had agreed to talk to our class about nymphs by asking her why she didn't live in an aspen tree because I thought aspen trees are prettier. Who know she would take offense to that? I thought I was flattering her. Anyway, after throwing some choice insulting words at me (one about me being a dull human who didn't understand the immense complexity of nature and its true inhabitants) she stormed away from my class and Professor Kettleburn thought that I deserved a detention. What's wrong with what I asked her? Search me.

Anyway, the point of this is that whenever James or I get a detention, the other one always secures themselves a detention as well. But I forgot that James isn't talking to me, so now I have to spend the detention alone.

That is why it is eight thirty and I am making my way by myself to the top of the Astronomy Tower (I don't think I've been alone up here in years) to scrub off the dragon dung that Peeves had smeared all over the lenses of the biggest telescope that the school possesses. Normally when I go up to the Astronomy Tower I have _much _different things on my mind. But not now. Now all I have to do is scrub at dragon dung. Not exactly romantic. Oh well, it's not too bad, I suppose. Lily's on duty tonight, patrolling the corridors and when I'm done maybe I can catch up to her and sneak off somewhere.

"Good evening, Mr. Black," says a voice as soon as I climb out on the Astronomy Tower. I turn to see Professor Sinistra, the Astronomy teacher. I flash my charming smile at her, and see the corners of her mouth twitch upwards.

"Good evening, Professor," I say.

She hands me a scrub brush and some sort of magical mess remover crap. Whatever. I just want to get this done and over with as soon as I can. So I smile widely at the Professor again. She graduated two years before I came to Hogwarts, so she's young for a teacher at twenty five – and very susceptible to my delightful (if I may say so myself) smile. This time I think I see her blush (it's pretty dark up here) and I brush her hand as I take the cleaning materials from her.

"Is that a new hat, Professor?" I ask. This time I definitely see her blush.

"Why, yes, Mr. Black," she giggles. I almost feel sorry for the woman. I should stop flirting with her. I guess Lily wouldn't approve. But honestly, I'm doing it out of my best intentions – so I can see Lily faster!

And my flirtations definitely get me somewhere. Half an hour later and after a quick scrub of the lens and a hasty oiling of all the moving parts of the telescope (focusing on not smearing the recently cleaned lens) she tells me that I can go. I beam at her before whisking myself away and down the tightly spiraling staircase down the tower.

As soon as I reach the bottom, I reach into my pocket and pull out a plain piece of parchment.

"I solemnly swear that I am up to no good," I whisper, tapping the map and lines snake out and trace a map of Hogwarts. I quickly glance around the map until I see Lily's dot wandering around on the fourth floor and I promptly set off in that direction. I occasionally take out the map so I can make sure to find Lily as quickly as soon as I can. Soon I see her dot around the corner.

"Mischief managed," I whisper, tapping the map again and the lines of the castle vanish. I hastily replace the map in my pocket and walk jauntily around the corner.

"Oh, hi, Lily," I say casually, as though I just happened to run into her by chance.

"Sirius! How did you find me? And it's after hours, I should take points from Gryffindor!" Is her immediate reaction.

I walk casually up to her and place my hands around her waist (I feel her quiver as I touch her), forcing her to look up at me.

"From your own house, Evans? You wouldn't!" I say, grinning down at her. "And how I found you is a little secret I'm afraid I can't let you in on. Let's just say it's a little piece of mischief."

"Sirius Black!" She says, but she is grinning, so I know that she isn't mad at me. "You are impossible!"

I lean down and kiss her lightly. Barely moving away from her so that my lips still brush against hers as I speak, I say, "Am I still impossible?"

"Oh, just – " But she is cut short as I close the distance between us and begin to kiss her in earnest.

There is a sound of something smashing and Lily and I break apart, looking around, Lily with a guilty look on her face. And there stands the very last person I would want to find me snogging Lily Evans in a corridor after hours, a glass shattered on the floor where it had been dropped.

"I," says James, and he looks like he's going to punch me again. I want to step away from Lily, but I know she wouldn't be impressed by that. But James merely stares angrily at me for another second and then he turns on his heal and storms away from the two of us. My heart sinks. I can't stand that he hasn't forgiven me yet. It's been weeks since Lily and I started dating and James still isn't showing any sign of forgiving me. Not that I should be, I just thought, maybe, our friendship meant more to him than a girl. Wait, that makes me a hypocrite. Damn.

I face Lily and drop my head down onto her shoulder. "I can't take much more of this, Lils," I mutter. Lily's hands appear on either side of my face and she lifts my head so that I'm looking her in the eyes.

"I talked to him today," she says quietly, "and I think that he's close to forgiving you. It's just going to take some time."

"I wish that time was over so that we could be friends again," I groan. "He is – was – my best mate. And I want my best mate back."

"I understand," Lily says, and I know she really does. Lily is just perfect in that way. I lean my head back down on her shoulder and she runs her fingers lightly through my hair. I'm going to sound like a total sap, but I feel safe here with Lily.

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**A/N: I'm not sure how long I want to draw out James being mad at Sirius. What do you all think? It's been a few weeks so far. What do you all think?**


	11. So What?

**A/N: AND…I'm back with another chapter! I think I might be moving too slowly, so I'm trying to pick up the pace a little. **

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**So…What?**

**Lily's POV**

It's Saturday and the girls and I are cooped up in the library trying to study, although this is hard as through the window right beside us the sun is shining and warm for probably the last time.

Ellen's having the hardest time out of the three of us – she kind of lacks the concentration that Leona and I possess in such great quantities, not meaning to sound big headed or anything. Merlin, I'm beginning to sound like Sirius. But I've already written a foot more onto my already three foot Transfiguration essay. Leona is pouring over her Potions book and scribbling notes down on the parchment beside her book. Ellen is staring out of the window for the fourth time in the amount of time that we've been in the library.

"_How_ can the two of you work when it's sunny outside?" She moans at us, tearing her eyes away from the sun lit grounds to stare incredulously at us.

"Well, as this is probably the second most important year of our schooling, after our seventh year and NEWTs, I think the two of us would like to put our best efforts into studying and making top marks," Leona says.

"I _do_ care about NEWTs!" Ellen says. "It's just so hard to care about all of this stuff when I could be outside enjoying myself."

I continue to scrawl on my parchment, intent on putting the sentence in my head down in ink before I forget what it is. Finally I tap the parchment with the tip of my quill for a period and then I look up at Ellen.

"Elle, we'll do something fun later, we just need to study now. And if I'm not wrong, you still have your own Transfiguration essay to write." I say.

"Why do my two best friends have to be so bookish?" Ellen asks.

"Because we're just so charming that you can't stay away from us!" Leona jokes.

"Well it's good to know that you've got a sense of humor, anyway," Ellen says in a semi-sarcastic voice. Neither of us answer, but merely exchange looks full of meaning with each other before resuming our work.

The sound of quills scratching on parchment and Ellen's frustrated sighs fills the air for a while until we are interrupted by none other than Remus Lupin, who is looking a little nervous, and is it just me, or is he looking sick again? That poor boy gets sick more often than most of the rest of the population of Hogwarts combined.

"Hey Leona," he says, and then quickly adds "Lily, Ellen. How are you girls doing?" Leona is blushing. What with Sirius and I getting together and the whole debacle of James not talking to Sirius and then those horrible murders, I completely forgot that our goal was to befriend the Marauders so that Leona could get closer to Lupin. I am such a bad friend, I totally forgot about that! I can't believe it. I really can't believe, wait, Leona is talking –

"Just working on some homework," Leona in saying, gesturing to the papers strewn across our table.

"Um, Leona, do you want to work on that Arithmancy paper?" Lupin asks. Leona is definitely blushing now.

"Uh, yeah, sure," she says, before grinning at Ellen and I and quickly clearing her spot, packing up her bag hastily, and following Lupin to some table a bit away from us.

Ellen and I exchange significant looks.

"What in the name of Merlin was that all about?" I ask Ellen.

"I'm not positive, but I think there's more than one girl from our group seeing a Marauder," she giggles, but trying to keep herself quiet so that Lupin and Leona don't hear.

"I totally forgot about her and Lupin, I feel so bad!" I say.

"It actually kind of slipped my mind, too," Ellen agrees. "Which is strange, because usually something like that never slips my mind!" That is true; Ellen is always very on top of who likes whom and that sort of thing.

I peer eagerly (and trying to be conspicuous) over at Leona where she is sitting with that Remus Lupin. She is smiling at Lupin and neither of them even has taken out a textbook, parchment, or quill. It looks like they were merely talking and laughing together.

Ellen looks at me, grinning widely and with one eyebrow raised. "What about _that_?" She mouths at me, looking excited. "I can't believe she never told us!"

Suddenly we hear a giggle coming from their table. Ellen and I share looks, our eyebrows raised.

"Did _Leona _just _giggle_?" Ellen asks, smiling widely.

I can't help but imitate her expression. "This is so perfect!" I try to squeal quietly. I know, I know, Lily Evans doesn't squeal, but hey, this is so cute! I think they would be perfect for each other. They're both bookish and brilliant and sticklers for the rules (as am I) and they are both kind of shy and reserved. In short, they're just perfect for each other. OK, well, Leona isn't exactly shy. She has absolutely no problem voicing her opinions. But still, they're cute together.

"I wonder why they haven't told anyone yet?" Ellen queried.

"Probably because they want Potter and Sirius to work out their differences before we add another turbulence to the equation," I suggest.

Lupin reaches across the table and brushes Leona's hand as he picks up a quill lying next to her hand. They both blush at the contact.

"Yeah, that's probably it," agrees Ellen, still not taking her eyes off of Lupin and Leona. Suddenly Leona turns her head and looks directly at us. It's impossible for us to pretend that we weren't looking at her, so we both smile at her and give her a small wave. Ellen gives her the thumbs up. Leona smiles back at us, and Lupin turns around to see who she's smiling at and sees us. Instantly he goes brick red, and after stammering something to Leona, he quickly stands up and strides from the library. Leona stands up and rejoins us over at our table, grinning like a fool.

"So?" Ellen asks immediately.

"So…what?" Leona says, trying to play innocent.

"How long has this been going on?" Ellen says, which is perfectly obvious what she was asking, if you ask me.

"What going on?" Leona says, still playing dumb.

Ellen rolls her eyes at me.

"How long have you two been together?" I say.

"Oh," Leona blushes scarlet. "That's nothing. We're not together; we're just friends, that's it." Ellen raises her eyebrows at her.

"That didn't look like nothing," Ellen insists.

"Well, it is," Leona says stubbornly.

Ellen smiles knowingly at her. "But you wish it were more, don't you?" She says.

"I – no, of course I don't!" Leona says defensively.

"You don't have to pretend with us," I tell her. "We know that you like him, and it looks pretty obvious that he likes you, too."

Completely forgetting her façade, Leona says, "You really think so?" Ellen and I beam at each other. I knew we could wear her down eventually, and this was really a lot easier than I thought it would be.

Ellen nods seriously at her, "I really do," she says.

"What did he want to talk to you about?" I ask.

"You heard him, we were going to work on our Arithmancy paper," Leona says.

I roll my eyes. "Do you really think that we're that stupid, Lea?" I ask. "Whatever the two of you were discussing, it certainly wasn't an Arithmancy paper."

"OK, he just wanted to talk to me, happy now?" Leona says slightly testily. She always gets testy when Ellen and I bug her about her crushes.

"No, I'm not," Ellen says immediately. "I want to know everything!"

"It's OK, Elle," I say. "We don't need to know everything."

"Thank you, Lil," Leona says, reaching into her bag and pulling out her Potions textbook and notes. I pick up my quill again and start to look over my Transfiguration essay.

"Do we have to study more?" Ellen whines. "Halloween is in two days!"

"Which means we really need to crack down so that we can relax on Halloween," Leona says instantly.

"You two are so _boring_!" Ellen insists.

"Sorry we want to pass our exams!" Leona says.

"But our exams aren't for another year and then some!" Ellen exclaims.

"Yeah, love," says a male voice behind me, "exams aren't for another year! What on earth are you doing cooped up in the library on a day like this?" And with that Sirius's hand pulls me to my feet, twirling me around, before he sits back down in his seat and pulls me down to sit on his lap. I kiss him, but Leona groans:

"Would the two of you _please_ be less cute! It's making me sick."

"Can't help it, Walker!" Sirius says, kissing me on the cheek. "Lily is just too cute!" Leona rolls her eyes.

"Oh, come on, Walker," Sirius says, "When you and Remus are together, you can be as cute as you want and I won't tell you to stop!"

Leona's eyes bulge out. "What?" She whispers.

"Oh, come on, Lion Girl," Sirius says. "Don't tell me you haven't noticed?"

"Noticed what?" Leona asks quickly.

"That the bloke fancies you, that's what!" Sirius says, slightly exasperatedly.

"See?" Ellen says immediately, rounding on Leona, "I told you!"

Leona buries her face in her hands. "Just lay off, all of you! She moans into them.

"You are so cute," Sirius says, patting Leona on top of her head. This breaks Leona. She looks up angrily from her hands, scowling at Sirius.

"You are _such _a _prat_!" She exclaims, shoving her notes and book back into her bag, hoisting it over her shoulder, and storming from the library.

"Hopefully she'll find Lupin and they can work things out," I say, smiling down at Sirius, gazing into his intense gray eyes.

"They'd better work something out soon!" Sirius agrees. "This whole 'it's nothing; we're just friends' bologna is starting to get to me!"

"So Lupin really likes Leona?" Ellen asks eagerly.

"Of course he does, can't you tell?" Sirius says.

"Well, yeah, but it's always good to confirm it with his mates," Ellen points out.

"Good point," Sirius agrees. After looking thoughtful for a few seconds, he adds, "And maybe he can make her less angry."

"That's what we're hoping for," I say. Sirius wraps his arms around me and squeezes me.

"Hey!" I say breathlessly. "Too tight!"

"Oh, sorry," Sirius says, grinning. He is such a fool. "I just can't stand you being so far away from me," he smirks at me. I swat his arm, and he kisses me again.

"Leona's right: you two really are too cute!" Ellen exclaims.

Sirius and I break apart, me feeling slightly embarrassed and ashamed, but Sirius is looking completely unabashed.

"Now, what do you say you pack up all that _stuff_," Sirius says, looking disgusted as he motions towards my books and parchments, "and go have some real fun?"

"But, Sirius, I need to study!" I say, trying to snatch my notes out of his hands, but he holds them out of my reach.

"No, you don't, let's go outside," he insists.

"But – " I say.

"No buts about it," Sirius interrupts me, shoving my parchment into my bag and dumping my books unceremoniously into my bag and, lifting me off his lap, swings the bag over his shoulder. Then he takes my hand, interlacing our fingers and pulls me out of the library, Ellen hot on our heels.

"Thank you, Black," she says as she hurries after her.

"Don't you think you can call me by my first name?" Sirius asks, raising his eyebrows at her.

"Oh, um, sure Sirius," Ellen says.

"And that goes for Remus, too. If he and Lion Girl are going to start dating, you need to call him by his first name also," Sirius says.

"OK," Ellen and I agree together.

"Oh, there's Carl Davis!" Ellen suddenly squeals, pointing at a handsome boy further down the corridor.

"Oh, not him, Platts!" Sirius exclaims. "He's a prat!"

Bristling, Ellen quickly says, "What about the whole using-first-names thing, Black? And besides, what's wrong with Davis? He's very good looking."

"Yeah, and that's the only thing he's got going for him!" Sirius insists.

"No it's not!" Ellen says, looking offended. "He's the Ravenclaw Quidditch team captain."

"And if you haven't noticed, we always flatten Ravenclaw," Sirius says smugly.

"Merlin, Sirius, would you deflate your head a little bit?" I say, but I still loop my arm through his.

"You do not always flatten Ravenclaw," Ellen says. "Remember third year? He caught the Snitch right from under the Gryffindor Seeker's nose."

"I didn't know you paid so much attention to Quidditch, Elle," Sirius says, looking at her with eyebrows raised. "And besides, our seeker that year was Edward Wright, and he was definitely not the best Seeker ever. Anyway, that was three years ago. Now that James, Michael Wood, and I are on the team, we're unbeatable!" Sirius looks slightly put out about the thought of James, but quickly pulls himself together.

"Seriously, Sirius? What did I just tell you about that big head of yours?" I ask exasperatedly.

"I'm just trying to tell Elle here that she can do better than Davis," Sirius says, looking at me sincerely.

"And what's that supposed to mean?" Ellen reacts a little testily.

"Oh, don't worry, Elle, I'll keep your secret safe," Sirius says, patting Ellen on the arm. Ellen rolls her eyes at me.

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**A/N: Come on guys, only one review? Please, I want more people telling me how they like the story! **


	12. A Little Bit Of Both

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**A/N: I'm so bad at remembering what I've just written. I was rereading my story to try and get my facts straight and I realized that I mentioned a Hogsmead trip like seven chapters ago and haven't mentioned it since then. Bad me, bad me. So let's just say that it was completely uneventful and not worth talking about, alright? Or even that it was canceled? I don't know, it can be for whatever reason you want it to be, alright?**

**Oh, and a catastrophe almost happened – I was walking today and I thought something fell out of my pocket. I looked around but didn't see anything so I proceeded to keep on walking. A lady who had passed me taps me on the shoulder and says "Here, you dropped this." It was my USB! All of my writing, including this story, is on it. I would have freaked out if I lost it. I almost hugged her, but managed to hold myself in. So you all are very lucky that you are getting an update today!**

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**Lily's POV**

Halloween dawns cloudy and miserable – well, most people think it's miserable, but I find the fog very relaxing. Unfortunately, it's the kind of weather that you want to curl up with a good book and a nice mug of hot cocoa in front of the fire, _not_ go to classes, as we have to today. Which is totally weird, in my opinion – I mean, this holiday is practically dedicated to us witches and wizards and yet we still have school. What _is_ that?

"Good morning, Lily!" Sings Leona's voice as she sits down hard on my bed and tries to pull the covers from over my head. Why does she have to be so _awake_ so early in the morning? It's not fitting. It's not even human.

"It is not a good morning," I mumble. "There is no such thing as a good morning."

Leona successfully pulls the covers off me and I sit up, trying to snatch them back.

"No such luck, lily, dear, you're going to have to wake up faster if you want your covers back!"

"Please give them back to me," I say, reaching my hands zombie-style in front of me for my blankets.

"Nope," says Leona's voice, and suddenly I feel her pull me to my feet. I rub my eyes and I can see the dormitory now. Ellen is sitting up in bed, watching the antics of Leona and myself.

"Up now, sweetie?" She asks me. I make a face.

"I guess so," I growl unhappily. Leona tosses something at me and I catch my robes clumsily.

"Pull them on, sweetheart," Leona says. Still grumbling, I take off my pajamas and pull my robes on over my head.

"Come on," Leona says, pitching my bag at me, which I almost catch, but it's too heavy and it drops through my hands. I bend over to pick it up.

"Must you be so cheerful in the morning?" I ask her, trudging towards the door and catching Ellen's arm as I go.

"Well, one of us has to be," Leona says, pounding down the staircase with Ellen and me following at a much slower pace.

"Good morning, love!" Comes Sirius's all too loud and chipper voice as I feel somebody collide with me and strong arms wrap around me.

"Oh, not you, too," I moan.

"Still not a morning person, are you?" Sirius laughs.

"No, I'm not, and I don't find this very funny," I try to say grumpily.

"While I, on the other hand, find it deeply amusing," Sirius says, entwining his hand with my own and leading me over to the portrait hole and out of it. "Don't worry, love, someday I will convert you into a morning person!"

"I doubt it," I mumble.

Once down at the breakfast table and after ingesting two cups of coffee with lots of cream and sugar, I really look around for the first time, revived from my morning stupor.

"Happy Halloween," I say, and kiss Sirius on the cheek.

"Awake now, love?" He asks, wrapping his arm around me.

"Yes, and I would greatly appreciate it if you and Leona would stop bugging me so much every morning before I've had my coffee!"

"But I just have so much fun bugging you!" Sirius pouts.

"Ditto that," Leona says with a piece of bacon halfway to her mouth.

"You two are just so…frustrating!" I say. "Ellen," I round on the sweet girl who is stirring some sugar into her porridge, "can you back me up here?"

"Well, Lil, I don't think I can," she says sweetly.

"Why not?" I demand, pouring myself another cup of coffee.

"Because I don't think I can deprive these two of their morning amusement," she replies.

"Ug," I say unintelligently.

After a while the bell rings for class to begin and we all pack up to go to Charms.

"Good morning, class!" Professor Flitwick squeaks to us all.

"Why does everybody insist on saying 'good morning'?" I mutter under my breath and Sirius chuckles as he sits down in his seat in front of me.

"That seat occupied?" Comes a voice and I see James looking at Sirius with a smile on his face and pointing to the seat next to Sirius. Sirius's face breaks into an immediate grin.

"By your lazy arse, yeah," he jokes. James slides into the seat and sends a fleeting smile in my direction.

"Evans," he says politely.

"Potter," I nod back calmly, but inside I'm dancing. James and Sirius are friends again! But I'm also dubious – will it really be this easy? Is this all it's going to take? A simple 'that seat occupied' and a smile and that's it? I know boys think differently than girls, so maybe that's all Sirius and Potter need, but it doesn't seem like it's enough to me, but then again, like I said, I am a girl and I don't understand the unknown lands that is the boy's brain.

I pay attention to them for the whole lesson, but their friendliness does not seem to be forced. They laugh and joke and goof off just as much as they used to and take complete pleasure in doing so. Professor Flitwick seems to be getting exasperated with them – all the teachers were given a nice break from the disruptions from Sirius and Potter when the two weren't talking.

"Mr. Black! Mr. Potter!" Flitwick finally calls out, frustrated. "Would the two of you _please_ stop being such – "

"Insufferable fools?" Sirius interrupts. There are a few titters from the rest of the class at this.

"Annoying idiots?" Potter supplies. A few more giggles follow this statement.

"James Potter and Sirius Black?" Remus jokes. All heads turn towards him. He rarely takes place in the class-disruption game that Sirius and Potter play, but every once in a while he makes himself heard. By now, the whole class is laughing.

"Yes!" Cries Porfessor Flitwick.

"But Professor!" Sirius says, putting on a look of complete shock. "How can I stop being myself? Or is it you want me to stop pretending to be James and him to stop pretending to be me?"

"Is there a difference?" Professor Flitwick mutters under his breath. Sirius and Potter smirk at each other.

"Not really," they say in unison.

"Well, whatever you two are – insufferable fools, annoying idiots, or just simply James Potter and Sirius Black – would you _please _just stop it?" Professor Flitwick is looking just about at the end of his rope. Sirius and Potter know how far to push teachers, and they recognize this as one of those moments where they need to back off.

"Whatever you say, Professor," Potter says.

"You are such a – " I say to Sirius when the lesson is over and we're walking down the corridor.

"Do we really have to go over this again?" Sirius interrupts.

"Insufferable fools, annoying idiots, or James Potter and Sirius Black?" Smirks Potter.

I make an incomprehensible sound of frustration.

"Come on, love!" Sirius says, slipping his hand into mine. I see Potter frown slightly as he looks at our entwined hands, but he quickly looks away. "It was just a laugh!" I can't help but smile.

"Remus," I start to say, but Sirius interrupts me.

"Don't start on him, Lils, hun. Moony's feeling a bit under the weather, he doesn't need you ragging on him," he says.

I look at Moony. He's looking even worse than he did two days ago in the library. He has giant dark circles under his eyes, which look rather red, his completion is gray, and he looks tired enough to fall asleep on his feet. In short, he looks like death warmed over to me.

"Remus, you really should go get looked at by someone at St. Mungo's," Leona says. "You are sick so often! Won't your parents pay for an appointment? Maybe you have some sort of disease or something."

Remus looks at her and shrugs. "I'll be OK, Leona, don't worry about me," he says, trying to sound as though the subject doesn't mean much to him, but I can tell he's happy that Leona's concerned about him.

X

"Finally!" Sirius sighs as we sit down at the Gryffindor table for the Halloween feast. "I can't believe how long classes were today!"

"I always thought we should have today off," I mention.

They all look at me. "Why?" Asks Potter.

"Well, it's a holiday dedicated to witches and wizards. Don't you think that if we have our own holiday we should take advantage of it?"

"You're funny, Lily," Leona says.

"Why?" Asks Ellen. "I'd like to have a day off!"

"You two are hilarious," Sirius laughs.

"Why?" I ask. "It seems perfectly reasonable to me."

"Lily – " Leona starts, right as Professor Dumbledore stands up and clears his throat. She shuts her mouth hurriedly and turns to look at the Headmaster.

Dumbledore spreads his arms wide, welcoming us all to the feast.

"Welcome, everyone, to the Halloween feast," he says. "Well, I don't have much to say, simply: Bunghole, doodle sack, oxter, spondulicks! Enjoy the feast!"

"What in the name of Merlin was that all about?" Sirius asks the table at large.

"They are just weird words in the English language. I don't really understand why he put in spondulicks, though," I say. Everybody looks at me like I've lost my mind.

"What?" I ask.

"I thought that Dumbledore was the only soul in this universe who knows the definition of those words, if they really are words," Leona says with raised eyebrows.

"So why is it weird that he put spondukies in with a whole bunch of other weird words?" Lupin asks me.

"Not spondukies, it's spondulicks. And it is an American slang word for money or cash," I say simply.

"And you know this…why?" Ellen asks me, looking completely incredulous.

"I like words," I say simply. "Is that a crime or something now?"

"No need to get all defensive, Lils," Sirius says, patting my hand sympathetically.

"Whatever, I just want to eat," I say.

"They better have treacle tart!" Potter says as he piles mashed potatoes on his plates and following it with ladles full of gravy.

"If any kid of yours likes treacle tart half as much as you do, the world might run out," Sirius points out.

"Well, it will be a good trait to pass on, as opposed to pigheaded mysteriousness," Potter jokes.

"Whatever, Prongs," Sirius says, shoveling peas into his mouth.

After eating as much as they possible could, the food disappeared and was replaced with delectable desserts.

"TREACLE TART!" Potter bellows, grabbing three slices and piling them on his plate. The whole table laughs at this.

"Hey!" Sirius shouts. "Leave some for the rest of us, hog!"

"Who says the rest of you even deserve it?" Potter asks, surprisingly quite clearly through a mouthful of tart.

"I definitely do," Remus says.

"No, that's what you want, Moony," Sirius says, pointing at a huge chunk of chocolate fudge. Remus's eyes light up at the sight of it.

"Yes!" He cries, reaching past Leona and Lily to grab the whole chunk, brushing Leona along the way. Leona promptly blushes scarlet.

"You are such a girl!" Ellen laughs at Lupin.

"WHAT?" Remus chokes with the fudge halfway in his mouth.

"Well, being a chocolate lover is kind of a girl thing," Ellen says.

"Says who? Since when?" Remus asks, eyes wide.

"Don't worry, Remus, Ellen's just being weird," Leona says, patting Remus on the arm.

"Good," Lupin says through a mouthful of fudge. "I'm not about to give up my chocolate."

"Are you going to share any of that?" I ask Lupin. I rather like fudge, you know. And Hogwarts fudge is the best!

"Ah, Lils, don't interfere with Remus and his chocolate," Sirius advises me. I raise my eyebrows at him.

"Oh?" I say.

"Yeah," Sirius says, gobbling down cherry pie. "He can get _very _possessive about it. Like a wolf." All three boys laugh uproariously at this. The girls and I share a look that clearly says _what is that all about_?

Little Peter looks up from his plain ice cream. "What's so funny?" He asks with wide eyes, wanting to be let in on the joke.

"Don't worry about it, Wormtail," Sirius says, thumping him on the back. Pettigrew looks down at his bowl without saying anything more.

"Padfoot, don't be such a prat to Peter," Remus says. "It was just a joke; you kind of had to be paying attention to get it, Peter."

"Oh," Pettigrew says quietly. I look at Sirius with a question look on my face. Sirius just shrugs at me. It really beats me why the other Marauders hang out with Peter, but I guess he must have some hidden qualities that I just can't see.

Finally the feast appears to be slowing down. Several of the Hufflepuffs have already gotten up and gone to their Common Room. (Or I'm assuming that's where they've gone.) Ellen stretches and yawns widely.

"I'm beat. What time is it?" She asks.

Sirius looks at his watch, and then pokes Potter and Remus hard in the side.

"Hey, guys, it's getting late!" He says.

"Yeah, and?" Potter says.

"Uh," Sirius says, giving Remus a pointed look.

"Oh, Merlin!" Potter exclaimes, hauling Lupin to his feet and dragging Peter along with him.

"Gotta run, ladies," Sirius says, pecking me on the cheek and dashing out of the Great Hall with his friends.

"What in the name of Merlin was that all about?" Leona demands.

I'm frowning.

"What's wrong, Lily?" Ellen asks.

"Well, I can't help but think that this is part of some sort of prank they're going to pull," I say.

"Oh, Lily, relax," Ellen says, but Leona frowns along with me.

"You know, that's a good point," she says. "Should we follow them?"

"Oh, guys, calm down, it'll all be OK," Ellen says.

"Alright, but if I wake up with green tentacles growing out my ears, I'm hexing you," I say.

Ellen yawns again. "I don't know about you guys, but I'm going to fall asleep in my plate if I stay up much longer. All this food is making me sleepy."

"Agreed," Leona says, and we push back our chairs and make our way out of the Great Hall, much slower than the boys.

"Ah," Ellen says when we reach out dormitory and flopping down on her bed.

"Don't forget to brush your teeth," Leona calls from the bathroom.

"Yes, _mother_," Ellen sighs sarcastically.

"Hey, I heard that! Just don't blame me if you end up with lots of cavities," Leona replies.

Finally we're in bed and the lights are out.

"'Night!" Ellen calls sleepily to us.

"Good night!" Alice replies.

"'Night," Leona and I say.

Pretty quickly I realize that the other girls in my dormitory are asleep. I just can't sleep. My boyfriend's best mate is once again his best mate. Today was definitely the best I could have hoped for. I'm just so happy that they're back on good terms. I guess it turns out a guy just needs 'that seat occupied' and a smile and everything is OK. Who would have thought? I will never understand how boys work. That just makes no sense. No apologizing, just a simple look and three words and a ruined friendship is back to thriving. I mean, they were totally getting along at the feast as though the past few weeks never even happened.

I gaze at the dark ceiling for a while, watching as the full moon cast looming dark shadows in the room. I roll over to look at the clock. It's eleven fifty. It's time for my walk. I always take a midnight stroll around the grounds on the full moon. And now that I'm a Prefect, I can actually get away with it. I know, I know, Lily Evans purposefully breaking the rules, but there's something about the full moon that enthralls me. I love it, how big and bright it is. I don't need to light my wand, the light the moon gives off is enough.

Slipping out of bed, I pull my shoes on and wrap myself in a warm cloak – October nights are cold. Walking through the castle is a synch. Nobody hears me, nobody spots me. I creep along stealthily, moving swiftly from silent shadow to silent shadow. Finally I'm out of the great front doors and onto the grounds. The grass is crunchy – it's died and dried out from the summer now. The cold air nips at my nose and ears, and I wish that I had had the sense to bring a hat and a scarf.

The full moon bathes the grounds in a soft, silvery light, leaving everything with a magical glow to it. The lake is gilded brightly, the little ripples caused by the light wind reflecting the moon. The trees however, are a deep dark green. I never go near the trees, I'm not really a fan of the Forbidden Forest – I think it's pretty creepy.

As I begin to walk around the lake, I find myself wishing that Sirius is here with me. A midnight stroll with my boyfriend sounds very appealing right now. We could lie down on the cold ground together and gaze at the stars, making wishes and sharing secrets. Maybe Sirius wouldn't do that, it's kind of a sappy romantic thing.

As I walk around the lake, I'm along the bank that is closest to the Forbidden Forest. I hear something running through the trees – it sounds like something big. Oh Merlin, what if there are werewolves in there? Why did I have to walk so close to the forest? What else could be hiding in there? I freeze in my tracks, suddenly not daring to move. I've never walked all the way around the lake for this very reason – so I could avoid the forest – but while I was thinking about Sirius I ended up way too close. I think I hear the snapping of twigs underneath some large animals feet, the rustle of leaves and branches as something sneaks through the woods. Oh Merlin, oh Merlin, oh Merlin, OH MERLIN! THOSE ARE EYES STARING RIGHT AT ME!

My terror roots me to the spot and I can't move. I want to scream and run away, but I can't. Suddenly there is a rapid movement and something explodes out of the trees, running right at me. I open my mouth in silent terror, and I can feel tears of fear begin to sprinkle down my cheeks. As the thing bounds near me, I close my eyes, damning myself for leaving my wand in the dormitory.

"Lily!" Says an urgent voice that I recognize. I open my eyes.

"Sirius?" I ask, and indeed, there is Sirius standing in front of me, hair greatly disheveled and eyes glinting in the dark. I stumble forward and wrap my arms around his neck. "Oh Sirius," I sigh into his shoulder. "I thought there was something coming to eat me."

"Lily, what are you doing?" Sirius asks, wrapping his arms protectively around me. "Nevermind, let's get up to the castle at once."

"What? Why?" I ask, puzzled at the stress in his voice.

"Because Lily, oh just come on," he says, taking my arm and pulling me away from the forest. I may be wrong, but I'm pretty sure I see fear in his eyes and hear it in his voice. Sirius isn't afraid of anything, what in the world is going on?

I stumble after him, tripping over rocks as he drags me across the grounds quickly. Finally he stops when we are right in front of the castle doors.

"Lily, don't do that, you nearly scared me to death," he glares at me.

"Do what?" I ask, completely nonplussed.

"Walk around the grounds on a full moon!" He says, waving his hands frantically in the air. He is really freaking out. I don't think I've ever seen him flip shit like this.

"Why shouldn't I?" I ask. "I do every month.'

Sirius goes white as a sheet. "You do every month?" He gasps.

"Yeah, I do," I say, wondering what is going on. "Why is that such a bad thing? Besides, you're out right now."

"Yeah, but I'm – " he starts to say, but I interrupt, getting angry.

"You're what, Sirius?" I demand. "Better than me? Only you and your friends can break the rules? I can walk around the grounds on a full moon if I like. I think it's beautiful."

"No, this has nothing to do with me thinking I'm better than you, Lily, I just don't want you killed, or worse!" He says, not elaborating.

"Killed?" I ask. "And what's going to kill me? And what's worse? " Sirius is still white, and looking stubborn. I get the feeling he's keeping something from me.

"I, well, Lily, I shouldn't tell you," he says, looking at his feet.

"And why not? Is this just some stupid prank that you and your mates are playing? Because I don't think it's funny."

"No, Lily, I don't think it's funny. It is definitely not funny, not funny in the slightest. It's not some prank, I, Lily," he looks at me hopelessly.

"Sirius, I can't stand this. You really think you're better than me, don't you? I thought that you actually cared about me, but you really – "

"Care about you? Of course I bloody care about you! That's why I'm freaking out! I don't want you hurt!" He explodes at me.

I plant my hands on my hips and glare at him. Whatever is going on here, I don't like it. This is the closest that Sirius and I have come to fighting, and it's hurting me.

"Lily," Sirius says in a softer voice. "It's not my secret to share."

"Not your secret to share?" I repeat. "So there is something you're keeping from me."

"Yes, there is – "

"Well, you had better tell me what the hell is going on!" I exclaim.

"OK, OK, OK, I'll tell you, even though it's not about me." He looks at me, placing his hands on my shoulders. "Lily, Remus is a werewolf."

I stare at him, open mouthed. "He what?" I ask, completely shocked.

"He's a werewolf," Sirius says. "But he's still a great human being. Just because he's got a furry little problem doesn't mean he's not a great guy, he – " I lay a finger on his lips.

"I know, I believe you," I say simply. "In fact, this explains a lot." Sirius raises his eyebrows at me.

"Like what?" He asks.

'Like how he's sick every month," I say, shrugging. "I figured there was something going on that he wasn't telling the rest of us, but I didn't like to ask."

Suddenly something dawns on me. "Wait," I say, "what are _you _doing out here if he's a werewolf? You're in just as much danger as I am."

At this Sirius actually smiles, the very last thing I feel like doing right now.

"Oh, as to that, well, James, Peter, and I are all animagi," he says, grinning sheepishly at me. I begin to crack up.

"That's hilarious," I say, laughing. "Good one, that's pretty funny." Sirius looks at me with complete seriousness on his face.

"Oh," I say, quitting laughing. "You're serious, aren't you?"

"Who did you think I was?" He demands, smirking.

"Shut up, you know what I meant," I say. Sirius grins at me.

And before my eyes my boyfriend turns into a giant, shaggy black dog. I stumble backwards.

"Wow," I mutter. "How on earth did you guys manage it? Wait, you aren't registered, are you?"

Sirius grins at me, not looking the least bit guilty. "Nope," he says. "Not going to report us, are you?" He jokes.

"Well, no, you know I won't. But I don't really get it, how does this make a difference?" I ask. "You all being animagi?"

"Well, werewolves don't hurt other animals, they're just a danger to humans," Sirius shrugs. "So we all worked our arses off in Transfiguration so that we could spend the full moon with Remus."

"But isn't that dangerous?" I ask. Sirius shrugs again.

"Sure it is, but if it'll help one of my mates, I'm all down for it. Besides, a little danger spices up life a bit," he says.

"Well, all I can say is that either you're a really good friend, or you're a complete reckless fool," I joke.

"A little bit of both?" He suggests. I smile.

"Well, that explains why the four of you are always exhausted once a month. I thought it was like your party night of the month or something."

"Would we really do that?" Sirius asked, mock serious.

I laughed. "Yes," I replied. "And I'm sorry I got mad at you," I say.

"There's only one way that you can repay me," Sirius says, a smile dancing on his lips. And he strides forward and, wrapping me tightly in his arms, begins to kiss me. We kiss until I remember the situation that we're in and I pull away. Sirius makes a sad face at me.

"What? That's all I get?" He says in a wounded voice.

"Well, you may be able to transform into a great dog, but I can't," I say. "And in case you forgot, there's a werewolf out here."

"You're right, as usual," he agrees. "Now you get inside, and I'll see you in the morning, alright?"

"Yes, sir," I say. Sirius grins and kisses me.

"Goodnight, love," he says.

"I like goodnights much more than good mornings," I say and turn to open the doors. Sirius waves at me and as I wave back, I see him turn and transform into a giant dog and then bound across the grounds towards the Forbidden Forest, where he disappears amongst the dark trees.

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**A/N: So Lily finally knows.**

**I would reply to more of your reviews, but a lot of them aren't logged in, so I can't reply!**

**And I try to reply to every review. I know, I may not be so good at it, but from now on, I will do my best. **

**So what are you waiting for? Tell me how you like this chapter!**

**Oh, and why do I deserve a review? Because i wrote 4,822 words for you! **

**I'm kidding :) But I really did write that much  
**


	13. Marauder's Code

**A/N: New chapter! Not much happens in this chapter, but it needed to follow the last chapter. **

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**Sirius's POV**

As soon as Peter wakes up, I drag him and James off to the hospital wing to visit Moony before we go down to breakfast. As we crash through the hospital wing doors, Madam Pomfry comes bustling over.

"Yes, you may see Mr. Lupin," she says to us automatically, completely used to the three of us coming to visit Remus at the end of every full moon. The three of us hurry over to the bed in the far corner that has the curtains drawn around it. I pull back the curtains to see not just Remus, but Lily as well.

"I couldn't sleep, I was so worried about you all," is the first thing Lily says to me in answer to my unspoken question. I smile at her. She is such a sweetheart. James and Peter look at me questioningly, but I don't explain to them that Lily knows Remus's secret. I'll do that later.

"Of course you couldn't, love," I say, walking over to her and kissing her on top of the head. I look down at Moony. He's still asleep, but I can see him stirring.

When he opens his eyes, they travel over the four of us standing there.

"Lily?" He croaks. "What are you doing here?"

"I just wanted to make sure that you were OK," Lily says, looking worried.

"No, I mean, why are you here?" Remus tries again.

"I was worried," Lily says, beginning to look confused.

"No," Remus says again. "What are you doing here?"

"Making sure that you're OK," Lily replies, looking more confused than ever. "Unless you'd rather I didn't worry about you or something."

"Well, how did you know to be worried about me?" Remus asks. Lily glances at me quickly. Moony catches the glance.

"Padfoot!" He says reproachfully. "You told her!" It wasn't a question. Peter and James look at me too, and I can see the disbelief in their faces.

"Well, yeah, I did," I say, looking down at my feet and scuffing my left foot on the floor.

"Why?" Remus demands. "It's not your secret to tell!" I knew I shouldn't have told Lily, but I didn't want to lose her!

"Don't get mad at him, Remus," Lily quickly intervenes. "It's really my fault. I made him tell me."

"Regardless of what you said to him, he still should have consulted me before telling you!" Remus says, and I can tell he's beginning to get really worked up.

"Why do you care that I know?" Lily asks, beginning to look hurt. Nobody hurts my baby.

"Moony, mate," I say quickly, coming to Lily's defense. "Don't be mad at her. Lily's a sensible girl, she doesn't care that you're a werewolf."

"I really don't," Lily says reassuringly. "I don't care at all. I still think that you're a great guy and you're perfect for – " she breaks off, blushing. I'm pretty sure she was going to mention Lion Girl.

"Perfect for what?" Remus asks curiously.

"Um, you're just perfect, it doesn't matter that you're a well, werewolf. It just adds to you," Lily says awkwardly. Remus raises his eyebrows.

"How does it add to me?" He asks.

I can see Lily trying to think of something to say, but finally she just shrugs.

"I don't know, Moony, I mean, Remus, I just think that you're a really nice guy is all, and it doesn't matter that you've got a, a – a furry little problem," she says, grinning slightly at me and looking at Remus hopefully. This breaks Remus. When anybody calls his condition his furry little problem, he is usually humored by it.

"Thanks Lily," he says, grinning a little. Lily really smiles now, and even though she's smiling at Remus, her smile still melts my heart.

"Um, guys?" Says Peter. We all turn to look at him.

"We're going to miss breakfast," he says.

"You go down, we'll catch you up," I say to him. Peter continues to look at us for a while, and then turns and walks out of the hospital wing. I don't really know what's up with Peter lately. He just seems so nervous around us. It's not like we're that mean to him, are we?

"So, how was your night?" Lily asks all of us.

"Not so bad," Remus answers. "It could have been a lot worse."

"You're telling me it could have been a lot worse?" I interrupt. "No freaking kidding it could have been a lot worse. You know that Lily was wandering around on the grounds last night?" Remus and James stare at Lily, horrified.

"You were out there last night?" James half-whispers. Lily shrugs apologetically.

"I always take a midnight stroll on the full moon," she explains. As I expected, James and Remus goggle at her, even more horrified than before.

"You always take a – " James says weakly. "Oh Merlin. You are so lucky to be OK."

"Yeah, I realize that now," Lily says, smiling half heartedly. "I didn't know there was a werewolf running around, I just liked the calmness and the moonlight."

"The calmness and the moonlight?" James whispers. "Lily, you're lucky to be alive."

"I know," Lily says. "I won't do it again, OK?"

"You'd better not," Remus says. "I'm not trying to sound like a control freak, Lily, but it's way too dangerous for you. I can't believe you were lucky enough to never have been harmed before."

"I know, I know!" Lily says, and I can see that she is getting a little exasperated.

"Alright, guys," I say, stepping in. "How about we get to class?"

"Good point," James says. "Catch you later then, Moony?" He says, and after Lily and I say our farewells to Remus as well, we walk together out of the hospital wing and to class.

X

"Sirius?"

"Hmm?" I ask. Lily and I are lying in my bed, Lily with her head on my chest. My arms are wrapped around her, holing her close to me.

"Why is it that you and Potter just made up so easily?" She asks.

"What makes you say that?" I ask. It took weeks for James and myself to make up, and to me, that was _forever. _How does that translate to "easily" for Lily?

"Well, he only asked you if he could sit next to you, and then suddenly, everything was fine," she says, looking up at me.

"Oh," I say. "Well, what else needed to be said? His asking to sit next to me told me that he forgave me and was ready to put everything in the past and come to terms that you and I are together. It showed me that he was OK with us, and that he no longer holds it against me."

"Oh," she says. "I didn't realize boys knew how to communicate that much without words."

"Hey! Are you saying that we're less evolved than girls?"

"No, I just, never mind," she says, snuggling closer to me.

After a short while of silence, I add:

"And it's Marauder's Code."

"It's what?" She asks, looking up at me again. I could drown in those eyes of hers. Really, they should be made illegal. They could cause me serious damage one day.

"Marauder's Code," I repeat. "We don't fight for long, because friends need to stick together."

"Is it really that simple?" She asks me. I shrug.

"Well, James and I are tight. As are all of us, the Marauders. We're just tight. We stick together. And nothing can come in between us. We may have our differences, but in the end, we have each other, and that's all that matters."

"It sounds a bit like you're married," Lily giggles.

"Hey!" I say. "We're just really good friends!" Lily wraps her arms around me.

"I know," she whispers. "And to tell you the truth, I really admire you four. You have such strong friendships. You would die for each other, and that's pretty amazing. I'm actually kind of jealous."

"Lion Girl and Ellen are good friends with you," I tell her.

"I know. Maybe we should make some sort of code for ourselves," she muses. "Although that kind of makes us sound like a little kids' club."

"Are you telling me I'm in a little kids' club?" I ask, pretending to frown down at her.

"You know what I mean," she says.

"What if I don't?" I ask, smiling playfully down at her.

"You do," she insists, smiling back at me. I roll over so that I'm on top of her and prop myself up on my elbows to look down at her.

"Alright, you win, I do," I say, leaning down and kissing her.

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**A/N: Sorry this is so short. I really am. I always try for upwards of two thousand words and I only managed a little more than one thousand. But like I said before , I'm going to try and pick up the pace a little, unless you guys like how it's going at the moment and don't want me to hurry up. So just review and tell me what you think of the pace, OK?**

**Thanks a million!**


	14. Too Much, Like Always

**A/N: So, you all will probably think that I am absolutely certifiably insane, but I had this thought the other day: I wonder if J. K. Rowling likes James Bond movies? I mean, she named Harry's dad James. I don't know, do the Bond movies even exist in England? Haha, I told you I'm off my rocker…**

**Anyway, on with the story:**

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**Too Much, Like Always**

**Lily's POV**

"Today's Quidditch match is Gryffindor versus Slytherin!" The announcer bellows to the crowd as the players speed onto the pitch.

I'm not one for Quidditch, personally, I mean, I enjoy going to the games, but it's more for the hanging out with friends in an exciting atmosphere than actually watching the game. Plus my boyfriend and his best friend are on the team. I'm kind of expected to go to the games.

Ellen, Leona, Alice, Remus, and Frank are standing with me, all of us screaming our heads off. It's mid November and freezing cold. All of us are wrapped in heavy cloaks and have hats shoved on our heads, thick scarves wrapped around our necks, and have our hands nestled in wooly mittens.

I watch as Sirius flies high above us, whacking a Bludger in the direction of one of the Slytherin players, who has to roll over in mid-air to avoid it. Potter is flying below him, the Quaffle clutched in his hands. My eyes travel back to Sirius just as a Bludger from one of the Slytherin Beaters rockets at him and he has to put on a giant spurt of speed and veer sharply to the left to avoid it. I clutch at my face, hopping up and down on the spot.

"Gryffindor SCORE!"

I look away from Sirius to see Potter punching the air after he scores the first goal of the game. I clap hard and cheer as loud as I can along with the rest of the Gryffindors. Ellen, who is jumping up and down beside me, hugs me and then screams some more.

The game passes in a whirl of excitement and high emotions. The Slytherins put up a good fight, but with Sirius keeping the entire Slytherin team on their toes by constantly pelting well-aimed Bludgers at them, Potter's Chaser skills and Murphy Wood's Keeping abilities, they are no match for our team. Potter and Sirius raise their fists in triumph as Anne Mitchell, the Gryffindor Seeker catches the Snitch right out from under the Slytherin Seeker's nose. The team meets in a glob in the sky, punching the air, high fiving each other and hugging in a mass of arms, legs, and brooms.

Meanwhile, Leona, Ellen, Alice, and I are hopping up and down, hugging each other and screaming. Leona is laughing her head off, and in a fit of hyper ecstaticness, she hugs Remus Lupin, who is standing beside her. Remus doesn't even hesitate before he is hugging her back, and the two laugh together until they notice all of us watching them with smiles on our faces. They break apart and look away from each other, each blushing furiously.

The Gryffindor team slowly makes their way to the ground and the rest of Gryffindor house, who had spilled out onto the pitch to hug the team. I run up to Sirius and throw my arms around his neck. He puts his hands on either side of my waist and lifts me up, laughing, and spins around with me in the air. When he sets me back on the pitch, he leans down and kisses me in front of the whole school. Wolf-whistles and cat-calls fill the air, along with more cheering from the surrounding crowd. When Sirius finally lets go of me, I stumble backwards, blushing at receiving a kiss in front of the whole school. Sirius is beaming around, winking and waving at particular students.

"PARTY!" Potter bellows into the crowd. "UP IN THE GRYFFINDOR COMMON ROOM!"

Sirius wraps his arm tightly around my waist and together, with the rest of the still-cheering Gryffindors, we begin to make our way up to the castle and out of the cold.

By eleven o'clock, heading on midnight, the party really begins to pick up and is in full swing. Sirius, Remus, Potter, and Peter had disappeared for a while, and when they came back they were laden down with Firewhiskey and Butterbeer.

"Drinks!" Sirius calls out. "Come get your drinks!" A mob of crazy Gryffindors surround him and the rest of the Marauders, taking a bottle or two for themselves each. When the crowd around them finally clears, I make my way up to Sirius.

"Firewhiskey, love?" He asks, offering me a bottle, beaming all over his face.

"Sirius!" I exclaim. "I'm a Prefect!"

"And so is Remus," Sirius replies. I look in the direction that Sirius is indicating. Remus has his own bottle of Firewhiskey and is pouring out measures into shot glasses in front of him, Ellen, Leona, Alice, Potter, and Frank surrounding him.

I turn back to Sirius, feeling exasperated. "Am I the _only _responsible one here?" I demand of him.

"Well, love, I hate to say it, but yes, I think you are," Sirius grins cheekily at me.

I feel myself giving into that smile. I toss my hands up in the air.

"Well, I say to hell with the rules tonight!" I say. Sirius lets out a bark of a laugh and hugs me tightly.

"I knew I'd destroy you eventually!" He says. Then he turns and bellows across the room to Remus:

"Oi! Moony! Pour Lily a shot, too!"

Remus looks up and grins at me from across the room.

"Right you are, Padfoot!" He calls back.

Sirius takes my hand and leads me over to the group.

"Where's Peter?" I ask as I stand around the table with the shot glasses on it with everyone else.

"Who know?" Potter says. "He's not much of a partier. Doesn't like being around so many people."

"Stop babbling and let's get on with this!" Sirius interrupts. Potter smiles and we all turn to the shot glasses.

I reach out along with everybody else and pick up a shot glass full of the amber liquid.

"Well, here it goes," I say, and drain the tiny glass. My throat explodes and my eyes tear up. I gasp and wince, putting the glass back down on the table a little harder than I had meant to.

"That is _disgusting_!" I exclaim.

"Evans, your face is priceless!" Potter laughs at me. Sirius, Frank, and Lupin are roaring with laughter too. Ellen makes a face back at me.

"I'm with Lily," she says. "That is totally revolting!"

"Who's up for another?" Sirius demands, lining up the shot glasses again and picking up the bottle of Firewhiskey.

Against my better judgment, I join in with everybody else as we all consent to another shot. Ten minutes later and I've had the first four shots of Firewhiskey of my life, and I feel my barriers falling blissfully away. I laugh and sidle over to Sirius, throwing my arms around his neck and kissing him on the cheek. He takes me and begins kissing me passionately back.

"PDA!" Leona cries.

Sirius and I break apart, but I'm not blushing like I normally would have been, and Sirius is beaming at me.

"Another shot!" Sirius cries, raising his shot glass in the air.

"You've got to be kidding!" Ellen says. "I've already had four!"

"So have the rest of us, Elle," Sirius grins.

Remus picks up the Firewhiskey bottle and pours everyone a generous measure each.

"Put your glass down, Padfoot, I can't pour this into it with you waving it around," he says reasonably to Sirius, who laughs and slams his shot glass back down onto the table, where Remus promptly fills it to the brim.

Lupin lifts his glass, and we all follow suit.

"To Gryffindor!" He said, and we clink our glasses together before draining them.

Gasping and blinking my eyes hard, I turn to look at Ellen and Leona.

"I think I'm drunk," I giggle.

"Oh, that's cute," Sirius says. "You're such a lightweight!"

"I've had five shots!" I say.

"You're not drunk, love," Sirius insists, "You can still remember how many shots you've had."

"Just because I can count doesn't mean I'm not drunk," I say. I stop, thinking about what I just said. "Wait, does that make sense?" I ask, feeling puzzled. My brain is fuzzy and I can't really think straight. Sirius laughs.

"I take that back, I think you are drunk!" He says. "Love, you are such a lightweight!"

"Hey!" I say. "I've never drank in my life, how am I supposed to be a heavyweight?"

"Heavyweight?" Frank asks me, eyebrows raised. His arm is wrapped around Alice's waist, who is giggling madly.

Leona wraps her arm around my shoulders and twirls her wand around.

"Watch!" She cries, pointing it at our shot glasses, which spout arms and legs and begin wobbling around the table. Leona giggles.

"Woops!" She points her wand at them again, and they begin to dance.

"It's like Beauty and the Beast!" I cry, clapping my hands as I watch the shot glasses tap dance on the table.

"Beauty and Beast?" Sirius asks, puzzled. "You really are drunk, Lils."

"No, no, no, it's a Muggle children's fairytale and the cups and plates and forks and stuff start dancing around!" I laugh. Sirius looks at me with his eyebrows raised.

"Wow, Muggles really have some weird imaginations," he says. I have to admit, the dancing shot glasses are pretty cool. But I can't let Leona show me up; I have got to do some showing off of my own! Merlin, Sirius Black must really be rubbing off on me.

I point my wand at the glasses, and they promptly start singing opera.

"No, that's not what I wanted!" I cry, pointing my wand at them again and they change to old country western voices. Leona puts her hands over her ears and screams:

"Stop, Lily! You're killing me!" I point my wand at the shot glasses for a third time, and this time they start singing a Weird Sister's song.

Everyone around us cheers and starts to dance. I point my wand at the shot glasses and the singing increases in volume.

Potter is laughing his head off, bent over, clutching his tummy. "That is hilarious!" He cries.

And then Ellen, sweet, composed, modest Ellen whips out her wand and points it at the Firewhiskey bottle. Two more bottles appear from the single one, sprouting arms and legs of their own. They wrap their arms around each other and start singing "Odo the Hero" in a very drunken manner as they stagger around the table.

"Now, now Platts," Sirius says. "I can't have the Firewhiskey bottles singing, I want to drink out of them! I can't drink out of something that's _singing_!"

Leona lifts up one of the Firewhiskey bottles and it shouts,

"Hey, put me down, put me down, I was performing!" Leona tips it over a non-dancing shot glass. ("Hey! My insides! Give me back my insides!" The bottle shouts as the Firewhiskey pours out.)

"To Chocolate Frogs!" She cries, throwing back the shot. This gets Remus's attention at once.

"Chocolate Frogs?" He shouts. "Where?" Leona pours another shot into the glass and gives it to Remus. He takes it, grinning at Leona, and raises it.

"To Chocolate Cauldrons!" He says.

Leona put her hands on her hips. "Chocolate Cauldrons?" She says incredulously. "Can't you come up with anything more imaginative than that?"

Potter pours himself a shot and shouts, "To Dung Bombs!"

"Dung Bombs? That's disgusting!" I cry.

Sirius pours himself a shot and says, "To pranks in general!"

Ellen sits down in one of the armchairs and I join her.

"My head is spinning," she says, holding it in her hand.

"Mine too," I agree. "Either there's three of you, or I'm really drunk."

We look at each other and start giggling and for a long time, we can't stop.

After a while, Sirius staggers over to me, wrapping his arm around my shoulders, singing loudly, waving an almost empty Firewhiskey bottle in the other hand.

"How much have you had?" I demand, crossing my arms. Sirius laughs, and, setting the bottle down on a nearby table, taks my hands, pulls me to my feet, and starts trying to dance with me, but we're both so intoxicated we can't really manage it right. But in my head, I think I'm the shit right now. Together Sirius and I dance (or stumble is more like it) around the room until Sirius trips and we fall onto a nearby sofa, Sirius landing on top of me. Completely forgetting that I am in a room full of people, I place my hands on either side of his face and kiss him passionately. Sirius responds quickly and we're in the middle of a full-on make out session when somebody falls on top of Sirius.

"Oof," I grunt.

"Ooh, sorry," giggles Alice. "Did I interrupt something?"

"Oh, no, not at all," Sirius says sarcastically. Frank holds out his hand, which Alice takes, and he pulls her to her feet and together they walk away, arms around each other, swaying a little as they do so.

Sirius and I manage to work ourselves around until we are sitting comfortably side-by-side, Sirius with his arm around my shoulders, me leaning my head on his shoulder.

Potter walks into view, his face repeated three times in the air, and I start laughing.

"You've got three head, Potter!" I cry. Potter raises his eyebrows at me.

"How much has she had?" He asks Sirius, who laughs.

"Not that much, but she's a complete lightweight," he says.

"And how much have you had?" Potter asks, eyebrows still raised.

"Too much, like always!" Sirius laughs.

"Well, be responsible, and make good choices!" Potter says, clapping Sirius on the shoulder, winking at me, and walking back into the thick of the party.

"Hey, Lils, look at that!" Sirius says in my ear, and I turn my head in the direction that he is pointing to see Leona and Remus wrapped so tightly around each other it is hard to tell whose robes are whose as they make out in front of the whole of Gryffindor House.

"I'm glad they finally figured that out," I laugh.

"Well, let's not get too excited about it; they might not remember it in the morning. To tell you the truth, I'm not sure I'll remember it in the morning myself," Sirius muses.

"I don't think I can stand it if they don't," I say. "I'm getting sick of their 'we're just friends' excuses."

Sirius nods. "Well, Remus isn't very good at charming the girls," he says, still watching the two. "He never lets a girl get too close to him; he always worries that they won't be understanding of his furry little problem."

"Is that why?" I ask. This is news to me. I knew that Remus never got serious with a girl, but I thought maybe he had commitment issues. It seems to be a common Marauder problem. Besides me, Sirius never had the same girlfriend for more than two weeks, and the same goes for Potter and Remus. Which make me wonder something…

"Sirius?" I ask.

"Mmm?" He says, not really paying attention to me, but still looking over at Leona and Remus.

"Why haven't we broken up yet?" Wow, I worded that badly. Sirius looks at me, complete surprise written all over his face.

"What, do you want to?" He asks. I shake my head emphatically.

"No, no, I definitely do not," I say hastily.

"So then what's the fuss?"

"Well, you've never stayed with a girl for as long as you have stayed with me," I say. I don't think this conversation is going very well. I should never have brought this up to begin with.

"Oh," Sirius says, and then after a while, he adds, "Well, there's something special about you. No guy would willingly give up Lily Evans." I feel myself blushing, but I find myself doubting his words. How many times has Sirius told a girl she's special?

"And I've never said that to a girl," Sirius says, as though he could read my mind. "But you, now with you, it's something different. You're a rare find." He smiles at me and kisses the top of my head.

The party begins to wind down as the crowd thins – some people going up to their beds, some passing out right in the Common Room. I snuggle closer to Sirius and watch the flames dancing in the fireplace. Sirius is showing no inclination of going up to bed, and I don't want him to. I just want to stay like this forever, his strong arms around me and his head resting on mine. Gradually I become less and less aware of what is going on and I nod off, dreaming of dancing shot glasses and Quidditch.

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**A/N: Here's a longer chapter to relish in. I don't think it was as funny as I was intending it to be, but maybe I got it a little funny? **

**My chapters might be a little short for a while here; I'm have a hard time breaking them up into appropriate sizes. Either they're like WAY long or pretty short. **

**I do have one thing to ask you all: November is NaNoWriMo month. For those of you who don't know what that is, it's where you basically write 50,000 words in a month. I know it's supposed to be your own writing, but I thought that maybe I could bend the rules (hey, I'm an artist, don't all artists bend the rules?) and work on this story instead of writing something else. For one, I have no ideas of anything I could write 50,000 words on, and for another, I love this story and don't think I could bear to leave it for a month. **

**Anyway, I would love to hear from you, tell me how you think the story's going. And yes, I do have a direction the story is going in, even if it doesn't seem like it.**


	15. Matchmakers

**A/N: What? Only one review? Honestly, that's all I get? You guys make me sad. :( **

**Anyway, as most of you are writers, you have probably heard of NaNoWriMo. If not, it's a project where you write a novel – 50,000 words – in one month – November. And this is my third year participating in it. My novel is going to be my main focus of that month, so you probably will not be getting very many updates from me. **

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**Matchmakers**

**Sirius's POV**

I awake the next morning with an absolutely pounding headache and the sun pouring down on me, hurting my eyes. I roll over and promptly fall out of my bed. Shaking my head in shock, I look up to see that I wasn't sleeping in my bed; I was sleeping on the couch with Lily. I don't really remember how we ended up there last night, but I do remember Lion Girl making the shot glasses dance and then making out with our Remus. Poor Lily, she'd never had anything as strong as Firewhiskey before, she's not going to be happy when she wakes up.

I kneel by the couch and gaze down at her. She looks so peaceful, her eyes closed lightly, a slight smile playing on her lips. I wonder what she's dreaming about. A lock of her beautiful dark red hair has fallen across her face, so I lift my hand and gently brush it away, tucking it behind her ear. Her eyelids flutter, and she blearily opens her eyes.

"What time is it?" She asks groggily. I look over at the clock above the fireplace.

"Eleven thirty," I reply. Lily tries to sit up, but groans and puts her hands over her eyes.

"I feel –"

"Terrible?" I supply, trying not to smile.

"Yeah," she croaks. "You're talking way to load. And that sun is way too damned bright."

"Here, I've got some pepper-up potion upstairs in my trunk. It really helps with hangovers," I say, climbing laboriously to my feet – my own head doesn't feel too good right now either.

When I go into the dormitory, I see that James, Remus, Peter and Frank are all still asleep, Peter drooling on his pillowcase. I creep over to my trunk and dig around, trying to find the bottle. Finally I find it, and I sneak back down the stairs to Lily, where I crouch on the carpet beside the couch.

"Here you go," I say, unscrewing the cap and handing her the bottle. "Just a little bit will do you good." Lily takes a carefully measured gulp. I watch as the grimace on her face gradually melts off until she's left looking slightly embarrassed. I take the bottle back and swallow some for myself. I feel the headache begin to recede.

"Did I get drunk last night?" Lily asks a little hesitantly. I grin at her.

"Yes, I believe you did, love," I say gently, tucking another strand of hair that had escaped behind her ear. Lily covers her face in her hands.

"Oh, I can't believe I did that!" She cries into them. "I am such an irresponsible Prefect! I should lose my position. McGonagall was so wrong to choose me for the Gryffindor Prefect!"

"Hey, hey, hey, Lils, it's OK," I say to her gently.

"OK?" Lily shrieks. "OK? It most certainly is NOT OK!"

"Lily, Lily, sshh," I say, placing a hand on the side of her face. Lily quiets and looks into my face for a bit. After a while, a smile tugs on the ends of her mouth, and the next thing I know, she is laughing uproarishly. I can't help it – I start to chuckle as well. I move so that I am sitting on the couch beside her, an arm around her waist as we roar with laughter. Finally we subside into occasional hiccupping laughs, but a lot calmer.

"Breakfast, love?" I ask, standing up and holding out my hand for her. Beaming that smile that makes me melt every time at me, she takes it and I pull her to her feet and then into my arms. I embrace her and kiss her with everything that I have in me. She tangles her hands in my hair, moaning into my mouth. I grip her closer to me, and she pushes her body against mine.

"Oh, get a room, you two!" Comes an irritated voice from the girls' staircase. I tear myself away from Lily to see Lion Girl standing there. I break into a grin.

"Remember anything from last night, Lion Girl?" I ask her, eyebrows raised significantly.

"Remember anything?" She asks. She doesn't say anything about my use of 'Lion Girl' – I suppose she's gotten used to it by now. "No, not particularly. I remember the dancing shot glasses and that's about it. I have got a pounding headache though."

I hand her the pepper-up potion and she takes a great sip.

"Easy there Lion Girl," I say, "you only need a little bit." Lion Girl is shaking her head experimentally.

"Ah, that's better, thanks, Black," she says.

"Come on, you can call me by my first name, can't you?" I ask.

"Lily doesn't call Potter by his first name," Leona points out.

"Touché," I agree and I turn to Lily. Before I can say anything else, Lion Girl suddenly asks:

"Wait, is there something from last night that I should remember?" I glance at Lily, and I can see her eyes laughing.

"Oh, no," I say, hardly able to keep myself from smirking.

"Wipe that look off your face!" Leona shouts at me. "What happened? What should I remember?"

"Oh, Leona, you really don't remember?" Lily asks.

"No, and I don't think it's funny for you two to sit there laughing at me about it," Leona replies.

"Well," Lily looks at me, and I smile at her to continue, "last night you and Remus started, well, kissing. Making out, really." Leona gasps and whips her hands up to her face, peering over the tips of her fingers at us.

"_No_," she whispers in a desperate voice.

"Uh, yeah," I say. Leona's eyes disappear under her hands.

"I can't believe it," she says, her voice slightly muffled. "I'm going down to breakfast." Her face still hidden in her hands, she hurries out of the Common Room, the portrait banging closed behind her.

"What's wrong with Leona?" Asks a male voice and we turn to see, yep, I guess it, Remus. I grin wickedly at Lily.

"Well, do you remember anything that might have happened last night?" I ask. I really am curious; I for one didn't see much of either of them after they started kissing.

"Um, well, I remember the dancing shot glasses," Remus says, cocking his head to the side as he thinks.

"You and everybody else," I smirk.

"Well, this includes you and Leona," Lily says, and I can see that she is smiling, too. I really have rubbed off on her.

"Me and – " Remus breaks off. "Wait, we didn't…did we?" He asks in the same desperate voice as Leona.

"If you mean kissing and then disappearing for the rest of the night, yeah," I say. Remus buries his face in his hands just like Leona had.

"Does she remember it?" He asks finally, looking up from his hands.

"No, she didn't," Lily says.

"Good," Remus says, "wait, what do you mean by 'didn't'?"

"Um, well, Lily told her," I say. Remus looks at Lil with disbelief in his face.

"You did?" He asks, flabbergasted. "But _why_ Lily?"

"I figured it was about time that you two figured this out," Lily says, shrugging.

"Figured what out?" Remus asks, playing dumb.

"You know what," I say. "You and Leona. Now go find her, I think she said she was going down to breakfast."

"I can't," Remus breathes.

"Go do it, Remus," Lily says, "she wants you to."

"She does?" Remus asks.

"Yes, she does," Lily says.

"Well, I guess I could," he mutters, and looking distracted, walks out of the portrait hole without saying good bye to Lily and myself.

"Well, love, how 'bout we head down to breakfast as well?" I ask, draping an arm over Lily's shoulders. Lily nestles her head on my shoulder, hugging me.

"Yeah, let's go down," she agrees. Her hand slips into mine and I follow her out of the portrait hole and down to the Great Hall and breakfast.

When we reach the breakfast table, Lion Girl and Remus are nowhere to be seen. Lily shrugs at me before grabbing a piece of toast and spreading strawberry jam (her favorite) on it. I reach over to grab the sausages and heap some onto my plate, following them with eggs and hash browns. Lily props up her newspaper on the pumpkin juice jug in front of her and immerses herself in it. I've learned not to bother Lily while she's reading the newspaper – she can get very grumpy. I watch as she flicks through the pages slowly, a small frown line forming between her eyes.

"What is it?" I ask after she closes the newspaper and looks down at it.

"More disappearances," Lily whispers. "A man who was married to a Muggle-born hasn't been seen for a week now and nobody has any idea where he is and his wife disappeared on Monday. A half-blood and her fiancé went to France and never came back – that was a month ago. And, and…" she stutters to a stop before I see her clench her jaw, "and another murder – a whole family again, even the twin two year olds." I see tears forming in her eyes.

"Lily," I say softly, but I don't know what to say.

"Oh, Sirius," she sniffs and I can see tears forming in her eyes. She gestures at her face, half throwing up her hands in frustration. "I'm sorry I'm being all emotional and everything on you, I just, what if it's my family next? Or Ellen's? Her dad's a Muggle and her mom's a Muggle-born. Right now it just all seems so surreal, like it's not really happening, but what happens when something happens, when something really hits home?"

I wrap an arm around her waist, and Lily turns her head and cries into my shoulder. I take her hand and trace little circles on the back of it with my thumb while trying to sound comforting. Well, I would try to sound comforting if I was actually saying anything, which I'm not, because I have absolutely no idea _what _to say.

"Lily, don't apologize for being emotional, this is a terrible thing to happen, and I know it's going to upset you. You don't have to apologize for it," I say, as that's the only thing I _can _think of to say.

"Well, I'm glad at least that you and your family are safe," she whispers into my shoulder. I tense up.

"Yeah, but they're on the opposite side. My brother wants to join up with Voldemort as soon as he can, which is when he turns sixteen. He won't be safe then. He might even be a murderer," I say this sourly. I hate talking about my brother, the little scumbag.

"I didn't know that he wanted to join Voldemort," she says, looking up at me curiously. "Is your family really like that?"

"I don't really want to talk about it," I say. I've probably already said too much to her.

Lily looks at me like she wants to contradict me, but instead, she just nods. The tidings the newspaper carried certainly serves to put a damper on my mood. As Lily and I walk to our morning Transfiguration class, hand in hand, both of us are silent. I know each of us is brooding on this upcoming war with this Lord Voldemort guy. I think about my horrendous family, how they don't give a shit about anybody unless their blood is of the so-called 'purest' kind. I think about my brother, who has always bought into that crap, swallowed it whole, wants to possibly kill people about it. I can't understand where I came from. Something must have been genetically messed up in me. I would say that I might not really be their kid, but I look just like a Black, just like my brother.

Someone taps me on the shoulder, breaking me from my thoughts. I look around to see who it is. Lily is standing by me, I had forgotten I was holding her hand while I brooded. I tilt my head to one side, questioningly.

"What?" I ask. Lily grins and points down the corridor, where Remus and Lion Girl are standing. They are both blushing madly, but are looking at each other, talking in soft voices. They haven't noticed Lily or I yet, so we stop to watch.

I can't hear what they're saying because they are talking so quietly, but I see Lion Girl go even redder after Remus asks her something, and then Remus takes Lion Girl's hands. He pulls her close to him and kisses her shortly. When they break apart, they are both smiling, and blushing a little less. They turn, taking each other's hands and walk on down the corridor, never noticing Lily and myself.

I turn and grin at Lily.

"I love playing matchmaker!" I joke. Lily laughs.

"I think I do, too," she giggles.

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**A/N: Alright, you know what to do! Review! I love knowing what you all think. **


	16. The Blowup

**A/N: Hey, I'm back! I know it's been a while. I'm up to 50,000 of my 80,000 words for you NaNoWriMo. (I'm challenging myself to go for 80,000 instead of the normal 50,000.) **

**So, as I am a bit ahead of schedule, I thought that I would provide a little reading for those of you who are not pounding out novels. (Or are trying to avoid pounding out your novel.) **

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**The Blowup **

**Sirius's POV**

"Lily!" I bellow up the girls' staircase. "The carriages are here and if you don't hurry up they're going to leave without you!" It's Christmas vacation and Lily is leaving Hogwarts to spend her vacation time with her family. Me? Of course I'm staying at the school. You wouldn't catch me dead in my parents' house anymore. I ran away last summer and I have absolutely no intention of going back.

Lily comes clattering down the stairs, heaving her trunk behind her.

"Taking much?" I ask, raising an eyebrow.

"Well, you know, I have to take clothes and homework and everything," she says, shrugging at me.

"You are just such a good student," I say, kissing her cheek and taking hold of her trunk. "Now let's get down there before you miss the train. Not that I would mind if you decided to spend Christmas here, of course," I wink at her.

"Oh, Sirius," she laughs. "I haven't seen my parents since the fall!"

I laugh, "And I haven't seen mine since the beginning of last summer." I shrug nonchalantly.

"Sirius?"

"Yeah?" I grunt. What the bloody hell did she put in this trunk? Ten ton elephants? To remedy the situation, I flick my wand at it and it floats into the air. I direct the trunk in front of me as Lily and I navigate the corridors.

"Why did you spend the summer at Potter's?" And why the bloody hell did she have to ask that question?

"Eh, well, I don't get along too well with my parents," I say. Wow, that's the understatement of the century.

"Why? Sirius, you never tell me anything about them – or anybody in your family." She stares up at me with her emerald eyes and I have to look away quickly or else I'll die trying to surface in them.

I want to say, Lily, Lily, Lily, why do you want to know about them? But instead I say:

"Well, there's not much to tell." I hate this topic with a burning passion of a thousand fiery suns. And no, I'm not dramatic at all.

"But I've told you about my parents," she presses. This is the problem with Lily; she doesn't know when to stop. Especially when it's about my parents.

"Look, Lils," I say, trying to be patient. "I don't want to talk about them right now; I want to talk about things I like. I'm not going to see you for a while."

"Sirius, you never want to talk about them," she continues. Why? Why me?

"True that," I say shortly, hoping that she'll catch on to the fact that _I don't want to talk about my parents and why I don't get along with them._ I don't want to talk about the Cruciatus curse or the cussing or the insults and the hexes. She doesn't need to know about any of those. Right now she doesn't know and I like it like that. I don't want her to pity me.

"Why don't you like telling me things?" Lily asks, and I can tell she's beginning to get frustrated.

I trip down the stairs as I am a little too peeved to really pay attention to where I am going. In consequence, her trunk comes tumbling down after me, my spell breaking, and I get squashed under it.

"Are you OK?" Lily asks, hurrying down the stairs to me.

"I'm fine," I say, picking myself up and brushing off my robes. To tell the truth, I'm pretty sure I just got a couple new bruises, but that's fine. I hope my little mishap distracted Lily from her interrogation of me.

"So why don't you like to tell me things?" She asks again. Damn, I should have known that nothing will distract Lily when she gets like this. I levitate the trunk in front of me and we start off down the hallway again.

"I don't know, Lily, I'm just not all that open about myself," I say, shrugging, but inside I'm getting a little pissed off.

"You tell James things," she says, and I can hear a definite pout in her voice now.

"James is like a brother to me," I say, thinking of how my real brother used to be a brother to me, until everything went to heck in a hand basket. "I just click with him," I say, trying to hold back my anger.

"So what am I?" Lily demands, stopping walking and planting her hands on her hips, glaring at me.

"Look, I just don't want to talk about this right now," I say. Merlin, this is _not_ the way this day is supposed to be going! I'm not going to be seeing Lily for a couple of weeks – I do not want to spend the little time we have left fighting.

"But you never want to talk about it. Ever! At least not with me!" I can hear her hurting. I don't want to hurt Lily Evans; I just don't like spilling my guts.

I take her hands in mine, but she wrenches them away.

"Sirius, what kind of relationship are we going to have if you are never going tell me anything?" She demands.

"Look, Lily," I say sharply, beginning to feel myself snap, "It's my business what I talk about in my life. I just don't want to talk about this. Right now, or ever! Is that really such a problem?"

Lily scowls at me. Damn. Why did I say that?

"Is that what you think?" She hisses at me, her eyes flashing dangerously.

I should say I'm sorry, apologize and offer to try and talk to her more, but instead, in a fit of rash, reckless behavior, I find myself shouting:

"Yes, that is what I think! And if you've got a problem with it, then you don't have to deal with me anymore!"

"Fine!" Lily snaps, wrenching her wand out. "Fine!" She points her wand at mine and breaks my spell levitating her trunk. The trunk crashes to the floor. "Fine!" She points her wand at her trunk and levitates it. "Fine!" And she storms down the corridor, away from me, leaving me with my blood boiling.

I storm up the staircases, barely paying attention to where I'm off to in my fit of rage. As I stomp my way down a corridor, I find myself seething about Lily – Lily and her nosiness, her inability to leave well enough alone, her stubbornness, her pure pigheadedness. Why does she have to always want to talk about my home life? I kick the wall, growling in anger.

**Lily's POV**

I march through the castle, practically seeing red as I try to get as much space between me and that pigheaded prat. Is it really too much to ask for him to actually tell me some things about his life? I tell him – I tell him about how Petunia won't talk to me anymore, how I'm no longer friends with Severus, how my dad is an alcoholic. All I'm asking for is a little information on him, here!

"Hi, Lily," A voice penetrates my furious thoughts. I look up, scowling, to see Alice. I'm in the entry way, people carrying their own trunks and making their way to the waiting carriages.

"Something wrong?" She asks.

"No," I say bitterly and unhonestly. "No, absolutely nothing is wrong."

"Lily, you're not a very good liar," Alice says, wrapping her arms around my shoulders.

"Sirius!" I bellow.

"What about him?" Alice asks, shocked at my outburst.

"He is just such an infuriating, uncaring, cold prat, that's what!" I say, feeling myself flush with anger.

"Oh, sweetie, what happened?" Alice asks.

"All I'm asking for is a little confidence!" I practically shout. People are looking, but I don't care. "I don't know what I ever saw in him!"

"Lily, calm down," Alice says comfortingly.

"I WILL NOT!" I yell. People are really looking now. "I don't ever want to see him again!"

"Lily, come on, let's go get in a carriage," Alice says reasonably. I can't argue with that, and it will get me out of everyone's gaze, which is only serving to infuriate me more. Alice and I direct our wands at our trunks and follow them out the door. Once we and our luggage are finally in a compartment on the train, I fall, fuming, into a seat as the floor starts to vibrate beneath our feet as the engine surges to life.

Slowly the view of Hogsmead station slips away as the train starts moving faster and faster away from Hogwarts and Sirius. How could I ever have dated him? He is just so full of himself, and he never confides anything in me.

"I was just a fool," I tell Alice, feeling slightly calmer now. "I fell for his charm, when really, there's nothing to Black." I try to spit out his name with as much malice as I can. "He's a good-looking face, and that's it. He has nothing else going for him, Leona was right." For a moment, I'm glad that Leona's not here so that she can't gloat over me, but I know she wouldn't do that. She and Ellen are staying at Hogwarts as well, but they chose to sleep in today instead of seeing me off, leaving me to have a blow up with my boyfriend. Ex-boyfriend?

"Did you two break up?" Alice asks, confused. I stop, considering her. _Did_ we break up?

"I don't know," I say honestly.

"Well, what did you fight over?"

"He just will never tell me anything about his life. He never tells me what his genuine thoughts are, his deepest desires." I sigh. "I can't believe I fell for him."

"Lily, this is just a little fight. You both just need time to cool off, and then talk to each other, work things out. Just because you had one tiny fight doesn't mean that the two of you are over for good," Alice says rationally.

"Alice, you weren't there," I say. I'm less angry now that I'm talking to someone who is calm and practical.

"No, I wasn't," Alice agrees. "But I've seen the two of you together for the past three months, and I can tell that you are happy together. You can't just break up over one little fight. If you just give up on a relationship every time you hit a rough patch, do you really think you'll ever really be in one?" Why does she have to make so much sense?

"Alice – " I start, but she cuts in.

"Do you really want this to be the way you live your life, Lily? Just one argument and a friendship is over? Remember when you and Leona fought earlier this year? Well, you two realized that it was a stupid thing you were fighting about and made up. You just need to talk to Sirius and everything will be fine."

"Alice, everything won't be fine because he still won't tell me anything, ever! He even said so himself," I say, feeling my anger beginning to resurface.

"Well, talk to him about it, tell him how much it bugs you, and maybe he can try and change. If he really likes you, he will try to change for you. And I know he really likes you. He's been with you since the beginning of October. He's never stayed with a girl that long."

I sigh and look out the window, leaning my head against it. My head thumps against the window pane as the train rattles and shakes down the tracks. Alice is right, of course. She usually is, she's got a knack for helping people with their problems. But this means that one of us – Sirius or I – is going to have to come forward and say something first. And both of us are very proud people. I, of course, should wait until Sirius realizes his mistake. It's my fault for him not telling me anything.

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**A/N: Yes, the happy coasting stage couldn't last forever, now, could it?**

**I'm really sorry, I really am, but they had to fight, it can't be all flowers and sunshine forever, now could it?**

**Anyway, please, please review! I really deserve one this time as I am updating during NaNoWriMo, don't you think?**

**Tata! **


	17. Do You Need Help?

**A/N: I did it! I officially got to 81,483 words for my NaNoWriMo. I am finished! So I'm updating again. Read on!**

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**Do You Need Help?**

**Sirius's POV**

After I calm myself down by stomping all over the castle, I finally return to Gryffindor Tower. I know I overreacted to Lily, but I just hate people prying into my family life. Isn't it enough for her to know that I don't get along with them? How much more does she need to know? Arg. I know I should apologize, but I'm not sure if I'm the one that should be apologizing. I mean, she was the one meddling in my family life. Really, she doesn't need to know the details. They would scare her, and I definitely do not want her pity for it.

"Gillywig," I say glumly to the fat lady, who swings forward to admit me into the Common Room.

"Sirius? Are you OK?" It's James. I must look awful, I sure feel awful.

"No," I say dejectedly, plopping down onto the couch, scowling. Remus is reading, James is sprawled on the couch as well and Peter went home for the holidays.

"What's up?" Asks Remus, looking up from his book.

I sit still, scowling at the fire. I can't even talk to James about this because it's about Lily. I should just go up to the dormitory and go to bed. Wait, it's morning. I'll just have to leave – go walk around the castle some more or something. Just as I'm standing up, Remus says;

"Is it Lily?" I sit back down hard.

"How did you know?" I demand, not looking at James.

Remus shrugs. "Lucky guess? So what's up with her?"

"She wants me to tell her more about my parents," I say shortly.

"Well, why don't you?" Remus asks. I give him a hard look.

"Why do you think, Remus?" I say coldly.

"You could just tell her," James says unexpectedly. I'm so happy he said something on the topic that I look at him.

"But what if she freaks out on me?" I ask hesitantly.

"Lily's a sensible girl, even if she does freak out, it will only be for a little bit, and she won't hold it against you," James says.

"Well," I say, voicing a doubt inside me, "I don't want her to pity me. I mean, I'm over them, I left last summer and I don't care. I don't care what they think about me, I just don't care. I don't want her feeling all sorry for me because they treat me like a piece of shit."

"I think that's rather asking a lot for her to not pity you," James points out. This surprises me.

"What?" I ask.

"Well, Lily's a girl, girls are more sympathetic and empathetic and all that jazz," Remus says. "Of course she's going to feel for you, I mean, your own parents use the Cruciatus Curse against you. That is appalling. What kind of parents do that? And even though James and Peter and I don't say it, we feel sorry for you, too. There's something you'll always be missing out on because you didn't receive love from your parents. And you've never been taught how to love. You love me and James and Peter, but you can't let yourself open up to somebody else, and that's going to ruin your relationship with Lily, Sirius."

I stare at Remus. "Um, wow," I say. "That was a lot."

"Well, it's all true," Remus shrugs. "And I figured somebody needed to tell you." I sit and glare moodily at a spot some four feet on the carpet in front of me.

"So you're saying that Lily and I are doomed for failure?" I ask, my heart thumping in my chest a little harder than is completely necessary.

"You are unless you open up to her," James says.

"Thanks, guys," I say sourly. "You make me feel like a million galleons. I feel so great now, you really know just what to tell a guy." I make to stand up again, but James puts a hand on my arm.

"You know, Sirius, you could learn," he says, looking me right in the eyes. I break our gaze as I turn away from him.

"Sirius, really," Remus says. "What do you plan on doing? Never opening up to anyone? You hardly even tell us anything – we guess at most stuff. We just get it right because we know you so well – or we know the part that you show us –"

"You know, Remus," I say testily, "I'm not really in the mood for another one of your lectures right now." I stand up and storm out of the Common Room.

"See you later, then, dear," the fat lady calls after me. I ignore her.

Why was James trying to help me with Lily? Shouldn't he have jumped at the opportunity to rip her from me? Although…now that I think about it, is she mine anymore? We never officially said that we were broken up. What did I say though? It was something along the lines of her not having to put up with me anymore. That does sound a bit like a break up line. Shit. I really have gone and put my foot in it, haven't I? Shit, shit, shit. I don't want to lose Lily Evans. She's the best thing that's happened to me in a long time. But maybe she's done with me. I don't deserve her anyhow.

I stop on my stormy way down a corridor to look out a window, through which I can see the gracefully sloping grounds. Lily left in that direction. I stare off in that direction, kind of hoping that I will see her running back up the lawn and through the castle doors to come and find me so that we can make up.

Merlin. When did I become so obsessed with the girl? I, Sirius Black, am notorious for not really caring about the girls I date. The girls never minded, it was kind of a bragging right to say that they were going out with me. I know, that sounds big headed, but it's true. But now? Lily and I had a little fight and I can't even go a few hours without my heart aching for her to come back to me so that I can hold her in my arms and tell her that everything is alright, that we'll be fine.

Lily is different. She's special. I know she thinks I'm just saying that when I tell her, but I really mean it. Never have I felt like this way about a girl. My heart and stomach still flutter when I'm around her, every touch from her sends tingles up and down me, a kiss from her and I never want it to end, I mean, even looking into her eyes and I'm in the danger of drowning in them. I'm separated from her for a few hours and I'm falling apart. I snap at my friends, who are only trying to help me, I stare out windows, I crash my way through the castle. This is becoming a problem.

And now I've probably lost her forever. She came nearer to my heart than anyone besides the other Marauders have ever been, and now she's gone. She took a bit of my heart with her, I'm sure of it. Maybe some of my soul, too – that's the only explanation for the vast void I feel inside myself right now. I sigh and bang my forehead on the window.

"All this over a girl, Sirius?" Coos a voice from behind me. I whirl around to see a pretty girl I recognize as being a Gryffindor in the fifth year.

"What?" I ask. Why is she talking to me? I try to remember if I've ever talked to her, but I can't think of a situation in which I did.

"Oh, come on, Lily was just another girl, you'll get over her," she says, smiling at me in what I'm sure she thinks is a charming, winning, seductive smile.

"You don't know what you're talking about," I say.

"Well, do you need some help getting over her?" This girl asks, looking up flirtatiously through her lashes, fluttering them at me. Months ago, I would have taken this girl's hand and lead her to the nearest broom cupboard, but I can't anymore.

"No, I don't need to get over her, we're not broken up," I lie (am I lying?). I hope to Merlin we're not broken up. The girl looks a little put out at this.

"Well, if you change your mind, come and find me," she winks at me, and then walks away, swinging her hips a little more than necessary. I roll my eyes. This isn't the first time that a girl has tried to get me to give up on Lily. After we'd been together for a month, when they seemed to realize that I wasn't about to break up with her of my own accord, they started popping up everywhere, pointing out her flaws and hinting at how they would be a better girlfriend than she is. Which they are very wrong about. Nobody could be a better girlfriend. She's the perfect girlfriend; the problem is that I'm a bad boyfriend. Maybe I can win her back, maybe I can fix this situation.

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**A/N: Somebody in a review said that Lily is being a bitch, and I was wondering if you all agree with that? I realize that she's being kind of…well, I guess I little bitchy, but I wanted them to fight, aren't all people bitches when they fight? I hope she's not overly so. Tell me if I need to make her less of a bitch, OK?**

**Reviews please?**


	18. Scared

**A/N: I must apologize for how long it's been since I updated. I haven't been writing since the end of NaNoWriMo. I know, bad me. But I'll try and update sooner, I promise!**

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**Scared**

**Lily's POV **

It's been three days since Sirius and I fought, and I haven't received anything from him. I have to admit, I was hoping for a letter or something telling me how much he missed me, even a fragment of how much I miss him. I want something to let me know that he is hurting as much as I am hurting. But it seems he's gone three days and it's not affecting him at all. He probably never cared for me to begin with. Maybe he just wanted to piss James off or something. I don't want to believe this. I want to believe that he's just busy and hasn't had the time to write to me. But busy with what? It's winter break, we don't have any homework, not that he really does that anyway. And it's not even the full moon, so he's not taking care of Remus.

It's been lonely here without all my friends from school. I don't expect Leona and Ellen and Alice to write me every day, but I do want to hear from them. I still haven't told Leona and Ellen about Sirius's and my fight, but they probably already know as Leona is going out with Remus. I thought that as soon as they heard, they would write consoling letters to me, but no. I haven't gotten anything from anybody. I feel so lonely. My parents will talk to me, but Petunia refuses to even look at me. The only times she will talk to me is when she talks about her boyfriend, Vernon Dursley. I haven't seen him yet, but he sounds dead boring. He wants to go into a career involving making drills. How mundane is that?

Well, if none of my friends are going to write to me, I might as well write to them. I forage around for quill, ink, and parchment, and sit down at my desk next to my window. There's snow on the sill and it's still falling outside. It's a beautiful, winter wonderland out there. Maybe later I'll go play in the snow. Although playing in the snow is not that fun if you don't have anybody to play with. And like Tuney would play with me. I suppose she's too _mature _to play in the snow. And Severus and I used to have snowball fights, but we're not friends any more. Anyway, back to my letter. Who should I write to?

_Ellen,_

_I suppose you've heard of my fight with Sirius by now. I don't want to sound pathetic, but you're at the castle, how is he taking it? He hasn't sent me anything, and I'm worried we really are over for good. I don't want to lose him, Elle. He means so much to me. Please tell me how he's doing. If he's not torn up about this at all, I need to work on getting over him before I come back to school._

_Now, enough about me, how's your vacation going? How are Leona and Remus? Tell me!_

_All my love,_

_Lily_

I get up and go over to my owl, Apollo.

"Here, Apollo," I say, clicking my fingers at him. "I've got a letter for you." He spreads his wide wings and drops down from his perch to my outstretched arm. I give him the envelope, which he clamps tightly in his beak, and then walk over to the window, pulling it open. Apollo takes flight and flies off through the thickly falling snow.

I sit down on my bed to wait. I wish that somebody was here to goof off in the snow with. I think I'll go find Petunia. Maybe she will forgive me enough to play around with me.

"Hey, Tuney," I say when I get down to the living room. She is sitting on the couch, talking on the phone. She waves an impatient hand at me, along with a glare, for me to shut up. From what I hear in her conversation, she's talking to that Vernon guy. I don't know what she sees in him. Really, I don't. Finally, after glaring at me many times to leave and I don't, she hangs up.

"What?" She demands.

"I wanted to know if you wanted to play in the snow with me?" I say, hoping against hope that she will say yes.

"With a freak like you?" Petunia laughs, eyebrows raised. "What made you think I would play in the snow with _you_? Besides, what are you? Three? Playing in the snow is for kids, freak."

I nod. I guess I kind of expected this reaction, but it still hurts. It hurts like hell. I leave the room. For once I don't have a comeback. All that I want is my sister to come back to me. I miss her. What about all those days we spent playing together when we were younger? Do those mean nothing to her?

I decide to go back up to my room to see if Apollo is back. He could be – he was specially bred for speed. When I open the door, I'm excited to see that he is. I take the letter from his beak and sit down on my bed to open it. Inside is Ellen's neat cursive. I smile. At least someone wants to talk to me.

_Lily,_

_I did hear about your fight with Sirius. I'm so sorry. What did you fight about? You don't have to answer if it's too personal. As for how he's taking it? Well, I haven't talked to him personally about it, but he is extremely moody and has been ever since you left. I think that, whatever happened, he feels bad about it. I'd ever risk saying he is completely torn up about it. Hun, can't you write to him? I think it would cheer him up immensely. _

_My break has been going fine. Mostly I'm just hanging out with Leona and sometimes the Marauders. Well, except for Peter, he went home. Leona and Remus are doing great. _

_Lots of love,_

_Ellen _

I finish reading and sigh, looking at the words _he is completely torn up about it_. Is Sirius really that upset over our fight? I didn't know I meant so much to him. And if I do, why will he never tell me anything about himself? And if he really is that upset of it, why hasn't he written me to apologize? I don't understand. What am I supposed to do? I decide to write back to Ellen.

_Ellen,_

_Do you really think that Sirius is that upset about our fight? If so, why hasn't he written me anything yet? And we fought because he never tells me anything personal. He just clams up when I ask him stuff about him. Alice says that it's a stupid fight and that we need to talk about it. I want to believe her. I really hope this is a stupid little fight. I don't want it to be more._

_Say hi to everyone for me._

_All my love,_

_Lily_

I send Apollo off with the letter and sit down to wait. I can feel my heart banging in my chest. I miss Sirius so bad; it's an ache in me. But I'm not kept waiting long, soon Apollo returns with Ellen's reply.

_Lily,_

_I agree with Alice and that this is a stupid little fight. Talk to Sirius about it. Tell him that he doesn't have to all of a sudden be an open book, just that every once in a while, you would like some personal information on him. You two just need to drop your pride for a few moments so that you can work things out between you. Don't worry about it, Lily. And why don't _you _try writing to him, hun?_

_ Lots of love,_

_Ellen_

X

X

_Ellen,_

_You really think so? Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you. I just want to hear from him, hear it from him that he's feeling torn up about this. Can you talk to him or something for me? Pretty please, Elle? For me? Maybe I should write to him, but I'm scared. _

_All my love,_

_Lily_

X

_Lily,_

_I'll try to talk to Sirius. But I'm not going to fix this for you. This is your relationship, you and Sirius need to work this out on your own between you two. I'm sorry I won't do anything more. But I'll go talk to him._

_Lots of love,_

_Ellen_

_P.S. I'm sure he's as scared as you are, by the way, sweetie._

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**A/N: I do think that Lily is being bitchy in this chapter. Really, she should apologize to Sirius, but well… she just has a lot of pride she's trying to swallow. **

**So, please review, and if you all review, I'll try harder to update sooner. ;) **


	19. Letter Writing

**A/N: Ahhh! I'm sorry I haven't updated in forever. I really am. What's it been? A month? Ahh, bad me. **

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**Letter Writing**

**Sirius's POV**

"Just write to her, Padfoot," Remus says three days after the fight. He and James are playing chess while I sit and watch sullenly.

"Yeah," James agrees, "I can't take anymore of this moodiness, it's driving me mad." I scowl at him.

"I'm not being moody," I lie.

"Right." James rolls his eyes at Remus, who smiles slightly.

"Look, it's bugging the shit out of you, and in turn you are bugging the shit out of us," James says. "Just write her a letter, apologize, and fix everything."

"Wait, why do _I _have to apologize?" I ask.

"Um, well, you were kind of the source of the fight," Remus points out. I slump lower on the couch. I fight to not roll me eyes.

"But she was prying," I say.

"Just do it, it will help," James says.

"Why do you want to help me with Lily?" I ask suspiciously, finally voicing my question. James shouldn't be trying to help me.

"Because you're my best friend, and I know that Lily Evans is impossible to get over. You won't be happy until she's yours again," James shrugs as one of his knights gets taken by Remus's Rook. This makes me feel even worse. Why does James always have to be the good guy? Why is he just such a better person than me?

Remus passes me his book bag. He had been studying before James had tempted him into the chess game.

"What do I want this for?" I ask, holding it and raising my eyebrows. "Surely you don't expect me to _study_?" I never study, Remus knows that. What is he playing at?

"Not study, you dork," Remus says, "My quill, parchment and ink is in there, write a letter to Lily."

I sit dubiously on the couch, considering.

"You really think that she will accept it?" I ask, trying not to let on exactly how much this matters for me.

"Well, you'll never know until you try, right?" Remus says reasonably. I sit there for a little while longer before digging a spare bit of parchment, a quill, and an ink pot out of Remus's bag. Setting them on the couch beside me, I stand up and make a move to move the coffee table closer to me.

"Oh, no you don't!" James says, gripping the table. "We're playing chess here. If you want to use this table you can sit on the floor."

"Fine," I say, sticking out my tongue at him. I know, I know, I'm really immature. But James knows it's all in good fun. I pick up the quill and parchment and sit down on the floor in front of the coffee table. Smoothing the parchment out on the table, I tap the end of the quill on the table, trying to brainstorm what I'm going to write. I've never been much of a writer, I don't really write to Remus and Peter, and I don't need to with James because we have those mirrors.

Finally I give up and look up at Remus.

"What should I write?" I ask him. Remus tries to peek at my parchment; I hastily try to cover it up, hoping he doesn't notice that I've written anything.

"You haven't even started it yet!" He exclaims.

"I don't know how to start!" I protest.

"How about just a 'Hi Lily'?" James asks sensibly.

"I can't write that, it's not right," I object.

"What about saying 'Dear Lily'?" Remus suggests.

"That's not right either," I say. Remus and James roll their eyes at each other.

"You write it then if you don't like anything that we suggest for you," James says.

"But I don't know how to write a letter!" I cry.

"You're on your own, mate," Remus says, moving one of his Bishops across the board. "And that's Check Mate, James."

"Ah, bugger," James say, scowling down at the chess board. Remus smiles. I sit on the floor, tapping the end of Remus's quill on the table, thinking.

"Would you please stop that, Sirius?" Remus asks. I look up.

"Stop what?" I ask.

"Stop tapping the table with my quill, it's driving me insane."

"Oh," I say, stopping. I sit for a few minutes, staring at the parchment. I wish Remus's quill could write my letter for me.

"Sirius!" Remus says, making me jump. I realize that I've begun tapping the quill again.

"I'm sorry, I don't realize I'm doing it," I say, stopping again."Shouldn't you be off with Leona or something?"

"She said that she was going to spend the evening studying in the library," Remus says.

"Don't you miss her?" I ask, trying to get him off my back about this letter.

At this moment, sweet little Ellen approaches us.

"Hey," she says, sitting down next to James.

"Hey there Platts," I say.

"I have to talk to you, Sirius," she says, looking hard at me.

"Shoot," I say, grateful for something to do besides staring at this stupid piece of parchment in front of me that I'm supposed to be writing a letter on.

Ellen looks at Remus and James, and then addresses me.

"It's about Lily," she says. My heart leaps in my chest.

"What about her?" I ask quickly.

"Well, I've been writing letters back and forth to her all day," she says.

"And?" I ask, hoping against hope that I still stand a chance.

"How are you doing?" Ellen asks.

"What do you mean, how am I doing?" I ask, trying to pretend that I'm fine.

"He's doing awful," James quickly says. I scowl at him. "What?" He asks. "You are."

"Is it about Lily?" Ellen asks.

"No," I say quickly. Why do I have to lie? I'm like a pathological liar or something.

"Yes," James and Remus say together.

"Well, she's too proud to send you a letter first, but she's all broken up about what happened on the first day of break," Platts says. My heart jumps into my throat. So Lily is feeling terrible as well? Maybe I still stand a chance then.

"We're trying to get him to send a letter to her right now," Remus says.

"Oh, you are?" Ellen says. "Well, then, I guess you don't need me."

"No, wait, Ellen," I say quickly. "What should I write to her?"

"That's your choice," she says, shrugging at me. "This is your relationship, not mine."

"Yeah, but Lily is your friend," I point out.

"Sirius, I'm not going to write your letter for you, you need to find out how to write to her on your own. I'll just tell you that she is dying to hear from you."

I growl as Platts stands up and walks away from us, heading up to the girls' dormitory. Is that really all the help Ellen is going to give me?

"Have you still not written anything?" Remus asks, sneaking a look at my blank parchment.

"I don't know what to write!" I say for what feels like the hundredth time. I'm not a letter writer!

"Well, maybe just think about how you would talk to her if it were in person and then write that down," suggests Remus.

I think about that. Yeah, that should be what I do, that doesn't sound too hard. Finally I dip the quill in the ink pot and put quill to parchment. I write, sometimes stopping and staring across the Common Room as I think of something to say. After a while, I stop and reread what I've just written. It's not a work of art, that's for sure, but I think that Lily will appreciate it just the same. Or, I hope she will.

"I'm going to send this," I say to James and Remus, blowing on it to help it dry.

"Alright," they say, already deeply absorbed in another game of chess. James wants to beat Remus so badly, but I doubt he ever will, unless he plays a game with Remus when Remus isn't paying attention or something. But Remus always pays attention to everything.

**A/N: Alright, you know what to do! Review!**


	20. Gratitude

A/N: There we go! An update in a reasonable amount of time! *pats self on back*

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**Gratitude**

**Lily's POV**

_Hey there love, _

_I don't know how to start this, so I'm just going to jump in with no preamble. I feel terrible Lils. I'm sorry I said that you didn't have to deal with me anymore. I'm sorry I never tell you anything about me. _

_And Lily, please don't just throw this letter in the trash. I'm not very good at verbalizing how I feel about people, but I'm going to do my best right now. You are incredible. I think you are one of the brightest, most beautiful, amazing girls ever. Just like you need a hoop to score in Quidditch with a Quaffle, I need you to make it through my day. I know we haven't been together that long, but you mean a ton to me. You mean a shit ton to me. _

_Lily, I will try to talk about myself to you. I don't want to lose you; you're the best thing that has happened to me in a long time. Man, now I'm rambling and stuff. But what I really want to say is: Please forgive me? _

_Yours Always,_

_Sirius_

_P.S. I miss you so much, love. _

I stare at the letter in my hand. My breathing is off. I can't believe I'm reading this. My breath catches in my throat and I can't stop smiling. Sirius thinks I'm the best thing that has happened to him in a long time. I feel like doing a happy dance around the room. Heck, why don't I?

After jigging around my room for a few minutes, I hear my mum call from downstairs:

"Lily! What are you doing up there, sweetie?" I stop bouncing up and down, but I can't stop smiling.

"Nothing, mum," I cry down to her. I sigh, and throwing my arms wide, fall back on my bed, grinning up at the ceiling. Sirius Black said he's sorry to me! He said he's sorry! To me! How many times has Sirius Black apologized in his life? Not that many, I am sure. I feel giddy with happiness. I can't believe that he actually sent me a letter.

After lying there for a few minutes, I realize that I should probably send him a reply letter. I sit up, brushing my hair out of my eyes, and stare at the letter still clutched in my hand. I stand up and walk over to my desk, where I sit down, taking out a piece of parchment, picking up my quill, and unscrewing the lid to my ink pot. I tap my chin with the end of my quill, thinking.

_Sirius,_

_You have no idea how much I loved that letter. Thanks for sending it. It means a lot to me. Thank you for apologizing; I realize that that's not something that you do all that often, so I know how much it means that you did. Thank you so, so much. _

_And I'm sorry that I always pry so much into your business, but I like to know that people can confide in me, and it hurts when my own boyfriend doesn't want to tell me anything about his life. I don't want you to tell me everything, just something that means something to tell me that you appreciate me and that you care about me. Just to let me know that you trust me, you know? _

_I miss you too, Sirius. I feel so alone here. Petunia won't talk to me, unless it's to brag about her boyfriend, who is so dull that I won't bore you with any information about him. She wouldn't stop rubbing it in that you and I had fought. Apparently she and Vernon have never fought, and she's very proud of that. _

_Have a good rest of your break!_

_All my love,_

_Lily_

**Sirius's POV**

I am sitting at breakfast when my owl returns to me with a letter. Before it even lands, I snatch the letter out of its beak and rip it open. My eyes quickly scan the letter, a grin on my face, and I let out a whoop and jump up, slapping James and Remus on the back.

"I take it that the letter you wrote went over with Lily?" Remus says, laughing.

"Yes!" I say, slapping James and Remus on the back again, just for good measure, you know.

"I told you writing that letter would help," Remus says, smiling bemusedly.

"And I'll always, always listen to your advice in the future!" I declare loudly, bowing to my friend the werewolf.

"I seriously doubt that," he says, "I'll settle for you merely saying 'thank you'."

I grab Remus's hand and press it to my heart. "Thank you, dear friend, thank you!" I say. Remus takes his hand back and wipes it on his robes.

"Calm down, Sirius, mate," James says, but he is grinning, too. I tilt my head to one side, shrug and sit back down.

"Whatever you say, Prongs – OW!" My owl, who I'm sure is much distressed by my lack of expressed thanks to him bites me on the finger. I stroke his back and say, "Thank you very much, Merlin." He bites my finger again, but this time with a lot less force and jumps into the air, cuffing my slightly around the head for my unforgivable lack of gratitude.

"Well, I'm glad that you two figured that out," James says. "I don't think I could stand sulky Sirius a minute longer."

"Come on, I wasn't that bad!" I say defensively. I turn to Peter, "Was I, Peter?"

Peter had been gazing over at the Slytherin table (I bet he's scared they're going to come over and start picking on him), but he looks over at me. "Wh- what?" He asks in a shaky voice, looking extremely guilty. Hmm…maybe he's dating a Slytherin in secret…What?!? It could happen! Well, maybe, I can't think of anyone who'd _want _to date Peter, but maybe I'm overlooking someone.

"I wasn't that bad, was I Peter?" I repeat.

"Oh, no, I suppose not," Peter stutters.

"Do you even know what you're agreeing to?" James asks, raising his eyebrows at our small friend. Peter shakes his head, but before Prongs or I can say anything else, Remus comes to his rescue:

"Do you guys always have to pick on Peter?" He demands. Peter gives Remus a worshipful look and James and I roll our eyes at each other.

"Whatever you say, Moony," James says, but drops the subject.

"So who wants to play some Quidditch?" I demand. James's face immediately brightens.

"I'm in!" He says, jumping up. We look questioningly at Remus and Peter, who look at us with a why-do-you-think-_we_-would-want-to-play-Quidditch look on their faces, and James and I shrug and bolt out of the Great Hall.

Soon we are on the Quidditch pitch with our brooms over our shoulders. I jump on mine and swoop into the air, James right behind me. I spin on the spot and punch James on the shoulder.

"You're it!" I shout over my shoulder as I pelt off in the opposite direction, James hot on my tail. We play broom tag for a long time until James finally stops flying when I tag him and hovers in the air.

"Let's shoot some hoops," He says. I grin.

"You're on!" I cry. "Race you to the Quaffle!" James and I tear through the air in the direction of the changing rooms and the place where the Quidditch balls were kept when nobody was using them. I win the race, and stagger a bit as I hit the ground a little harder than I meant to.

Soon the two of us are back in the air as we circle and dive and spin in attempts to score with the Quaffle.

"I'm starving, let's go in for lunch!" James finally yells at me. I nod and the two of us shoot towards the ground. As I dismount, James's hand appears on my shoulder. I look up to see him with a very serious look on his face.

"What?" I ask.

"You know, I really am very happy for you two," he says, and then adds, when I look confused, "you and Lily." I nod and James removes his hand from my shoulder, and we troop back off towards the castle together.

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**A/N: There ya go! Hope you enjoyed it. I'm sorry, but I really hate Peter. **

**Alright, you know what to do. :)**


	21. Can't Remeber

**A/N: Hello there, one and all! I'm sure you all thought that I disappeared into a black hole or something, but that is not the case. I went on a wonderful two month long trip to Ireland. My boyfriend flew out to see me because we missed each other so badly, and he ended up proposing after a night out on the town in Galway. (In the rain at six o'clock in the morning, kneeling in a puddle, I might add. Sigh…so romantic…) We came back to America, and now we're married and planning on moving to this small town with a college (the highest one in the world) in the middle of the mountains. I also got sick for a month, so it's been a while since I've written anything.**

**So thanks to all of you who waited so patiently to continue to read my story, and I hope that you all won't be too mad at me for disappearing for so long. It's been a very exciting three months, I can tell you!**

**I just wanted to tell you all (because a lot of people seem to be wondering) that this is not an AU fic, Lily **_**will**_** get together with James in the end… even if it doesn't seem like it right now. **

**Can't Remember**

** Sirius's POV**

Winter break is over and we're back into classes. And what classes they are! All the teachers seem to think that we have nothing better to do than homework. The only way I get through all my homework (or rather, most of it) on time is because Lily and Remus bug me and James twenty four seven about it. Ever since I wrote that letter to Lily, it's been smooth sailing. I try to open up around her; I know that I'm doing a very bad job, but I also know that Lily knows that I'm trying, and that's all that really matters to her.

"Bah!" I say one evening, throwing down my quill and letting the roll of parchment that I had been writing my Defense essay on roll back up. "What is with all these teachers and all this bloody homework?" I ask, glaring slightly.

"It's our sixth year," Lily replies patiently from where she is sitting with her head bowed over some diagrams. "Did you expect it to be easy?"

"I certainly didn't think I'd be spending my whole life on homework!" I say emphatically.

"We're studying for our NEWT's," Remus says, looking up briefly from his potions book.

"Well, I'm sick of studying," I say. "What do you say to a trip to the kitchens, Prongs?"

James looks up eagerly from whatever he was working on (he's probably working just as hard as I was…) "That sounds like an incredible idea!" He says excitedly. The two of us bounce to our feet. "Who's with us?" James demands of our study circle. Five pairs of eyes look up at us – Peter looks like he wants to go run and hide (which he probably does want to do), Lily and Remus are looking quite exasperated, and Lion Girl and Ellyn are looking pretty dazed. Nobody answers James.

"Fine," I say, grabbing Prongs' elbow, "you all sit here and have a ball with your homework, and James and I will have the time of our lives down in the kitchens." I can tell that Lily and Remus both want to reprimand us, but they refrain from doing so.

Prongs and I bounce out of the portrait hole together, full of energy now that we're away from that Merlin-damned homework. Practically skipping down the hallway, we chatter about Quidditch. When we get to a stairway, I jump on the railing and throw my hands up in the air as I slide down it. Reaching the bottom, I land on the carpet and raise my fists in triumph. There's some little second year girls standing there at the bottom of the stairway, and they shrink back from me and James, who comes bopping down the stairs after me.

"A perfect 10!" James cries, leaping the last five steps and landing next to me.

"Who's the shit?" I shout, jumping up and down. The second years give James and myself a scared, fleeting look before they flee down the corridor. I grin at James.

"I love frightening those poor little fools," I say.

"Who doesn't?" Says James as we head further downstairs to get to the Kitchens, James breaking into a song about a famous Quidditch player who lost her mind after she got hit too many times in the head by a Bludger and had to go to St. Mungo's to get her head straightened out while I join in loudly. We run down the hallway, singing our fool heads off and practically bouncing off the walls. What can I say? We are James Potter and Sirius Black. We're supposed to be a bit crazy. Crazy? What? Who said anything about crazy? I'm completely sane, thank you very much. Wait? Am I crazy? Who's crazy? I'm crazy? When I went to your schools? When I went to your churches? When I went to your institutional learning facilities?

And then I jumped down a stairway, doing a full back flip in the middle of it, crashing into the wall and cracking my skull at the bottom. Fuck, that's all I can think. What about Lily? Am I going to just die right now? Because she's the love of my life, I can't leave her now. All this because I'm too lazy to do my homework? I should have stayed and done my homework, otherwise this would never have happened. This should teach me. Oh no…I can't move…darkness closing in around me…pressing closer. I can't breathe…I must be dying. Dying…dying…dying.

If this is dying, it's not so bad. In fact, I can even breathe a bit better now, wait…I think I can even move now. I stir my arms and legs. Maybe I can open my eyes now, too. I struggle with my eyelids for a minute, and then, lo and behold, I open my eyes! Blinding white! I slam my eyelids closed again.

"Sirius…Sirius!" Says a far away voice. What is serious? Maybe I can open my eyes again. I think about that for a few moments, and then open my eyes. The light is a little less blinding this time, so I squint, trying to look around. A few fuzzy shapes are floating around my head.

"Sirius!" Says the voice again.

"What?" I croak. Hmm…I must be able to use my mouth.

"Sirius, how are you feeling?"

"What's serious?" I ask.

"No, you Sirius. You are Sirius," says the voice. Wait…I think I vaguely recognize that voice.

"I'm serious? About what?" I ask.

"No, your name is Sirius," says a voice. Wait…is that a different voice? Now I'm confused. How many voices are there? And where in Merlin's name are they coming from? And what the bloody hell are all these blurry shapes around my head?

"My name is…what?" I ask. I forgot what was going on.

"Your…name…is…Sirius," says the voice. I think it sounds a bit anxious now. Anxious? Is that a word?

"My name is serious? What's serious about it?" I ask. I am so confused right now.

Another blurry shape appears over my head and a woman's voice that I also recognize says, "How is he doing, dears?"

"He doesn't even know his name," says a completely different voice, but it's still one that I think I recognize. Why am I recognizing all of these voices, but don't know who they belong to?

"Alright," says the woman's voice. Suddenly something completely awful and burning is poured down my throat, burning my esophagus. Wait, what the hell is an esophagus? I don't know, why are you asking me?

I cough and splutter as the awful burning liquid makes its way down my throat and into my stomach. Suddenly everything around me becomes a lot more clear. There are five heads around me, all looking down at me concernedly. Three guys and two females – one a girl and the other a woman. Do I recognize these people? I'm not sure.

"So, what's your name, dear?" Asks the woman.

I forgot what a name is. I frown, thinking hard. "I don't know," I say finally.

"It's Sirius," says a black haired boy standing next to my bed. Oh yes, I remember now, those voices kept telling me that it's serious.

"Right," I say vaguely. "What's serious about it?"

"No, not serious," says the girl a little exasperatedly. "It's S – I – R – I – U – S."

"S – I – what?" I ask. I'm a little distracted by how pretty the girl is.

"Oh dear," says the woman. "I'll have to go and get my head injury potion." She disappears from my bedside, leaving me with the three boys and the girl.

"Who are you?" I ask. "Who's that woman? Where am I, and why is my name so serious?"

I see the four people look concernedly at each other.

"Well, I'm James," says the black-haired boy, "and this is Peter," he says, pointing at the short, squat boy, "Remus," pointing at the boy with sandy hair and blue eyes," and this is Lily," he says, indicating the pretty girl with red hair.

"She's very gorgeous," I tell the boy who had done the introductions.

"She's your girlfriend," the black haired boy says. Damn, I already forgot what his name is, I'm so completely blown away by this piece of information.

"You're my girlfriend?" I ask, looking into the girl's green eyes.

"Yeah, I am," she says, frowning slightly, looking worried. She turns to the black haired boy, "How hard exactly did he hit his head again?" She asks him.

"Well," he responds, "it was pretty hard. He jumped down the stairway and smacked his head pretty hard at the bottom."

"Must have been quite bloody hard," says the sandy haired boy, "if he can't remember any of us, or even his own name."

At that moment the woman reappears by my bed with a potion in a goblet, which she hands to me. I take it, looking into the contents at the bright blue potion inside it. It smells so bad, it makes me gag.

"I'm supposed to drink this?" I ask, looking at it incredulously.

"Yes, dear, it will help," says the woman. I look up at the other people standing around my bed.

"This guy says that that pretty girl is my girlfriend," I say, pointing at the red headed girl. The woman turns to glance at her before turning back to me.

"Yes, she is," she says, "So why don't you drink that potion, it will help you remember her." I look down at the disgusting potion in the goblet I am holding.

"It will?" I ask hesitantly.

"Yes, it will," says the woman. I look at her suspiciously. Maybe she's lying. Maybe this potion will kill me.

"You drink some first," I say, holding out the potion to the woman, who is looking quite incensed by now.

"Fine," she snaps, snatching the goblet out of my hands and drinks a sip of the potion. I can tell she's trying not to make a face at the taste. I look at her closely, trying to see signs of poison, of which there appears to be none. I take the goblet resolutely back as the woman hands it to me. Plugging my nose, I gulp down the potion, gasping when I finish, as the disgusting stuff burns worse than Firewhiskey.

A weird sensation begins to swell in my head, and my vision goes blurry. My head suddenly feels so heavy I can't hold it up on my neck, and my chin drops onto my chest, and I feel myself falling backwards onto something soft. The next thing I know everything is black.

**A/N: Once again, thank you for hanging on so patiently while my life kind of went on a whirlwind for a while. I really appreciate it if you all continue to read this story. **

**So, you know what to do! Please review! Sorry I gave Sirius a head injury. He'll be fine, I promise you. I was just having major writer's block and that's what came out…**


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